


The Dawn of Duty

by dubbledore



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Age Difference, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Gen, Marriage of Convenience, Minor Character Death, Past Rape/Non-con
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-08-12
Updated: 2016-04-07
Packaged: 2018-04-14 10:58:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 25,914
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4561950
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dubbledore/pseuds/dubbledore
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Stannis holds fast against Melisandre’s urgings of sacrifice and successfully brings his campaign to the gates of Winterfell. With the Boltons deposed and Sansa Stark restored to her inheritance, the king repositions himself at Winterfell, looking northward in anticipation of an entirely different war to fight: the war for the dawn. He needs to unite the North, but its lords will only stand with him provided one condition.</p><p>Fix-it fic for everything that went wrong after episode 5x07. Compliant with show-canon up to that point, with book-canon filling in the gaps as needed.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Recognition

**Author's Note:**

> So. This fic has been as much a surprise to me as babies must be to those ladies on _I Didn’t Know I Was Pregnant_. Which is to say, did this actually come out of me...? How?? Bad analogy aside: I only meant to write a barebones summary of stuff I wished had happened with Stannis on the show (instead of, uh, whaddyacallit), but that was a few weeks ago. Now I’m sitting here in the middle of a full-blown fic. And very much winging it.
> 
> The title (portentousness aside) hopefully puts the reader in mind of Maester Aemon's refrain, "Love is the death of duty." I've always thought this was only true in a narrow sense, because in so many other ways love is the very reason for people to keep to their duty and their vows. I think this is especially true of Stannis, hence "the dawn of duty."

“Damn you, I will not say it again— _no_.”

“It is the only way—”

“If it’s the only way, then so be it!” the king’s voice rang out. His face was ridged with anger, all sharp edges and shadows. After a breath, he continued more calmly. “I’ve suffered worse than this storm. Snow and ice... mere frozen water to the blood I share with my daughter. My _heir_. You say you’ve seen my victory in the flames, but only that. You’ve not seen my child burning. There is no _obligation_ to carry out this—this monstrous act.”

It was almost like innocence, his refusal to see, and for that the priestess despaired. She reached for him, but he recoiled just as he had done the day before.

_Words, then._

“Blood is nothing to the Great Other, for He will destroy it as He destroys all. The Lord of Light has named you, my king, has given you Lightbringer to defeat this darkness. You know there is only one way to truly bring the blade to life—only one way to ensure swift, bloodless victory.”

“Bloodless?” Stannis scoffed. “No great victory is won without blood. You would have me spill my daughter’s, and more.”

“One drop of the most precious blood will be the saving of all others. So it was for the hero of prophecy. So it is for you. You must make a great sacrifice.”

“Listen to me. I have lawbreakers within my own ranks. Men who steal, who threaten one another with swords—of every kind, I hear. Though I would pardon them their crimes to maintain our advantage in numbers, they can all be given to your god. There. That is a great sacrifice. On your life, I’ll hear no more of any other. I’ve punished better men for lesser treasons.”

Melisandre’s red eyes blazed, but the stare Stannis returned was harder than black ice, and she thought perhaps he truly meant his threat.

At length, her shoulders fell.

“I shall retire now, Your Grace,” she announced, and began to leave.

“Fine. If you’ve exhausted your counsel, tell the guard outside to send for Lord Davos.”

She paused on the threshold. A silent appraisal took place, a mental calculation that ticked and ticked until it gave way to resolution.

This wasn’t the time. She could not force these things, not truly.

“As you wish,” she said lightly. But it was with a heavy heart that she turned on her heel and walked out.

-

One of his captains brought him the news the next morning.

“Sire, the Lady Melisandre was seen at dawn riding out of camp. Northward, I’m told. It was thought to be on your orders.”

His wife was torn between staying with them and following her red priestess. Stannis allowed Selyse her dilemma and her despair, knowing that she, at least, believed. And she was the queen; in this, she was free to act as she saw fit. Returning to Castle Black would see her reunited with the spiritual balms Melisandre offered, and no doubt proper nourishment as well. He would arrange to protect her with a royal guard of whatever knights he could spare and send for her when Winterfell was won. But his wishes were that she stay with him, together with Shireen.

“I believe Melisandre has abandoned me,” he told her, “and devoted though you are to her teachings, you may not be afforded by her the same special regard you enjoyed while she thought of me as her god’s champion. And Shireen... If you are truly free of this delusion of sacrificing our only living child, she must have her mother. She will not be removed from my protection now, and I’ll certainly not send her anywhere the red woman is known to be.”

After a moment of pained consideration during which Stannis balked to imagine what her mind held, his wife had agreed. But the days that followed made clear one thing, at least: Selyse’s faith was shaken. The daily nightfires ceased, and she no longer prayed in sight of others.

When the thaw came a few days later, Stannis was quick to take advantage. A screen of outriders was sent out, and the main host followed at a safe distance, moving slowly as though yawning as it gathered strength anew. As they left the thinly populated, mountainous regions of the north, their numbers became bolstered by small parties of roaming northmen who joined up as soon as they learned that this Baratheon king and his army meant to free Winterfell.

In turn, Stannis learned that Ned Stark’s oldest surviving child, one Sansa Stark, lived captive in her own home. The northmen said she had been recovered from King’s Landing months ago, only to be forced to wed the Bastard of Bolton.

They turned away from the kingsroad as Winterfell grew near, delving west into the wolfswood to conceal their strength. A little over a day’s march from the castle, the outriders encountered an abandoned crofter’s village, well-positioned around a frozen lake and surrounded by tall, hardy ironwoods and pines.

Stannis made camp there and issued orders to cut down lumber for siege engines, new spears, pikes, and arrows. The northerners among them broke small holes in the ice and fished for their dinner, and soon the lake was riddled with holes. The nights were still bitter cold, and the days no better, but with grilled fish in their bellies and so much work to be done every sunrise, the men’s spirits ran high.

So near to Winterfell, the land was practically crawling with Bolton scouts. Stannis’s own men outnumbered them, capturing each and extracting information before giving them to the sword. They learned that Bolton had returned from Robb Stark’s campaign with most of his modest strength untouched by the bloodshed at the Twins. Since taking up residence in Winterfell, he had successfully mustered forces from a number of vassals throughout the North: Cerwyn, Hornwood, Dustin, Ryswell. Yet despite Ramsay’s marriage to Sansa Stark, many other lords remained silent, including those whom Stannis himself had not been able to budge—Manderly, Mormont, Glover, Umber, Reed. The North had bled heavily, it was clear, and among Bolton’s fighters more than a few were said to be but green boys and greybeards, left behind when Robb Stark had called his banners.

This and much more they learned from Bolton’s scouts, who were usually green and grey themselves, ruled by the fear instilled in them by the Boltons and just as easily moved by the fear that arose from being questioned by a king. It was inevitable that one should escape his reach, however, and when that came to pass Stannis knew the time had come to confront the risks.

He resolved to send Davos and a guard of experienced fighters—knights he would have chosen for his own guard in battle, and even a few northerners—away with his family to find shelter before the battle found them. They would stay apart until it was over, until the flaming hart on yellow could be seen flying over Winterfell, and he entrusted to Davos the task of looking after his wife and daughter should he meet his end.

“I am trusting you, Davos, as I have trusted you these many years. My family is my family; I have no other blood left to me. They deserve their place in this world. Shireen especially.”

“I won’t fail you, Your Grace. I pray we will return to your side soon, all of us unharmed.”

“So long as you don’t pray to the red god. Though I know you to be an unbeliever.”

His onion knight betrayed a faint smile then—a rare sight, in these times. Wordlessly, Stannis watched it rise and set across his craggy face, then nodded in dismissal. He returned to scrutinizing his map table. Davos’s face he knew well; if he hoped to see it again, it was the lands of the North he needed writ upon his mind.

They were both thin, the queen and princess, when he saw them off. Stannis thought Selyse might be even more fleshless than she was during the siege of Storm’s End. As for Shireen, she was Renly all over again. Of course, she did not latch herself to his legs and beg for nonexistent cakes and sausages as his brother once had, but her young face was pinched in a way that was all too familiar, in a way that shamed him. Clothing hung loosely on her frame too, even seeming to engulf her at times.

Yet as before, there was nothing he could do for her, for any of them. Nothing but warfare: a bloody, dirty scramble to gain the top of an ever-shifting heap of bones, just for a moment’s peace and comfort. How he hated it, the way men would go back on their word and break vows to make the spilling of blood a necessity. Robert had been one of those men. Noble though his cause had been in rebellion, he’d loved the scramble. From drawing plans and marching to fighting and even dying, there was not one aspect of warfare that Robert hadn’t glorified. Small wonder Stannis had never understood his ways.

Still watching Shireen, he realized her eyes had not left him either, and it seemed they were silently pleading for him to approach. So he did, craning his head to look up at his daughter on her dappled grey palfrey.

“You will win, Father, I know it.”

“I intend to,” he told her. “But you know as well what will happen if I don’t. You are my only child, the only trueborn Baratheon after me. The crown must pass to you. It will be... difficult. Lord Davos will look after you to the best of his abilities, but you must be unafraid and fight for your rightful throne. You understand me.”

“Yes. I am your daughter. It’s my duty.”

Stannis felt the corners of his mouth curving up, straightening his usual frown. “Yes... So it is.”

He jerked his arm upward, took hold of her gloved hand. It was even more awkward than he had thought, to initiate contact like this, but she clasped his hand in return without hesitation and the discomfort melted away. His eyes turned soft of their own accord, and for several long moments he did not feel cold at all. But the chill returned with the thought that he may have spent the past weeks growing unexpectedly familiar with his daughter only to be torn from her and life itself after all.

“Now go.”

-

Bolton had sent his bastard son and a sizable force of battle-thirsty men on horse to engage them. It was neither too bold nor too cautious a move, but veered into foolhardy with Snow in command. The Bastard had thought to take them unawares before dawn—but Stannis and his watchful men were equal to that, and discerned their movements well in advance.

The boy was arrogant and noisy with his horn, shouting insults at Stannis across the field once assembled. He gave the terrain before him nothing more than a cursory glance before joining his vanguard in the charge across ice that had hastily been covered over with old, soggy pine straw.

Stannis had only a glimpse of greedy, colorless eyes gleaming in a fleshy face before the expression contorted into an even uglier version full of shock and rage. As man and horse fell with a breathless crash through the rotten, hole-ridden ice into the depths, stones and arrows rained down on them from either side.

The waters would be poisoned with corrupt blood for years to come.

The remaining enemy forces devolved into chaos after that, roughly a third of them immediately turning tail to flee back east. Stannis’s men trapped the rest of them between the village and the ice they were now so afraid to tread. It was a quick, bloody battle, with few prisoners worth taking from Bolton’s mongrel army. The horses were far more valuable.

What bodies remained were stripped and plundered, then burned, as Jon Snow had so urged. With his host thus bolstered by success and warmed by the flames, Stannis wasted little time before embarking on the final march to Winterfell as the sun rose.

(And if the feeling that the battle had been too easy visited him, he brushed it off in short order. It had been a simple outmaneuvering—a contest of wits, and of mettle. It was how he had won all his battles in the old days, before the red woman.)

Near dusk, his scouts presented to him a pair of travelers found wandering the edge of the wolfswood, a man and a woman.

The man was a wreck of a human, gaunt and bearded, barely speaking and frightened of his own limping shadow. The woman, who could scarcely be older than a maiden, removed her hood to reveal striking red hair, and at this Stannis almost started, pulse leaping unsteadily. But no, this was not the blood red of Melisandre. This was auburn, a natural red.

“Name yourselves.”

“Sansa Stark.”

Tully red.

He saw it then: in the fine-boned structure of her face, her blue eyes and straight-backed poise, the girl favored her mother. But her solemnity was all Eddard Stark’s.

“Surely Sansa Bolton,” he said evenly.

She tensed up like a wild prey animal at that, then clenched her jaw before speaking. “No, I am a _Stark_. I was forced to marry Ramsay, just as I was with Tyrion Lannister, but Tyrion never touched me. Ramsay... Ramsay did, but... I will not. I will _never_ take his name. My house is the nobler, the more ancient, and I will _die_ before I have to go back to him and bear his bastard children.”

“Calm yourself. I only meant to discover your loyalties. Ramsay Snow is dead. I saw him drown with mine own eyes.”

The girl’s wide eyes and gaping mouth put Stannis in mind of the trout after which her mother’s house took its sigil. “You... He’s dead? Are you sure?” The ragged man beside her had raised his head as well, eyes even more enormous than hers.

“Do you doubt the word of a king?”

“A king...?” She was dazed, but then looked him up and down for the first time, fixing her gaze especially on the sigil embossed onto his breastplate. “You are King Stannis.”

“And you are Sansa Stark.”

She seemed to hold her head a little higher then, and her mouth firmed up.

“Had your bastard brother known of your predicament, perhaps he wouldn’t have been so quick to refuse me in favor of keeping to his post on the Wall,” Stannis observed.

Her eyes brightened at the mention of Jon Snow. “You’ve seen Jon? Have you come from the Wall? Your Grace.”

“Yes. Your half-brother is well, and has risen already to Lord Commander of the Night’s Watch. But he’s wasted amongst those low criminals and wildlings, all of them freezing their tails off at the end of the world. He’d have done better to join with me.” Stannis frowned. “Is this companion of yours mute? Or a servant? Speak, man. Who are you?”

The man stammered, apparently terrified of the sound of his own voice. “I’m—I’m... R-Reek...”

“Who?”

“You’re _Theon_. Theon Greyjoy,” said Sansa forcefully.

“ _Greyjoy?_ ” repeated the king incredulously, but he went unnoticed; a snow shrike had called somewhere in the trees above them, causing the man to jump terribly. His face grew twisted in unknown horror.

“Milord can’t be dead... He’s playing a trick, he’ll come back and hurt us all... I should never have done it, should never have killed her... It’s never—there’s no escape!”

“What are these ravings?” Stannis demanded. “Are you Balon Greyjoy’s son or not?”

“Forgive him, Your Grace.” Sansa Stark was not unaffected by Theon’s craze, shaking slightly as she gripped his arm tight to control him. Her uneven breath issued from her lips as a mist in the freezing air. “It’s been but a day since we escaped Winterfell, where we were captives of the Boltons. They... They mistreated us... most gravely. Theon has been in thrall to Ramsay for much longer than I know. We beg you, please give us certainty that Ramsay is dead. And that Roose Bolton’s time is coming as well.”

Repulsed by Greyjoy’s madness and ruined appearance, Stannis addressed Lady Sansa alone. Tersely, he recounted Ramsay’s defeat on the ice and affirmed that Winterfell would be next. He meant to have justice for the betrayal at the Twins and now, moreover, for her own person. He promised her safety and, if the battle was won, her home as well, providing she bent the knee.

As for Greyjoy, Stannis had half a mind to dispose of him just as any soldier would deliver an injured mount from its misery. His father had been a usurper, claiming a kingdom that wasn’t his to claim; Stannis would have removed Balon’s head years ago were it not for Robert’s leniency. And now his son appeared to be no better, in service to a low traitor. Even worse, Stannis recalled hearing that he had been responsible for the murders of the younger Stark boys and the sack of Winterfell. No, the world certainly had no use for him.

Stannis said as much aloud, but Lady Sansa immediately petitioned him to spare the creature. She wouldn’t be alive were it not for him, she said, her eyes wide and earnest. Stannis, impatient to keep marching, reluctantly acquiesced to her wishes for the time being. It was novel for him to show any clemency to a kraken, but the girl insisted that Greyjoy was innocent of the stated crimes, that he had saved her.

He had seen stranger things.

-

As they came within hours of Winterfell, his mercy proved to have been in good faith. Greyjoy, who was said to have lain as quiet as a mouse in the baggage train overnight, suddenly pleaded for an audience with Stannis.

“I am short on time, and patience,” he snapped as Greyjoy was brought up beside him on an unsteady old stot. “What is it?”

“P-please, milord—Your Grace. They say... They say some Bolton men escaped the ice, and returned to Winterfell.”

“Yes. The curs.”

“Lord Bolton... He will not want to appear reek—weak, _weak_ —in front of the other northern lords after such a loss. Especially after losing—after... m-milord—” The wretch’s face took on an expression of fearful anguish as he suddenly whipped his gaze about, looking around for a dead man who would never rise. Then he took a great, trembling breath and appeared to come under control of himself again, to Stannis’s irritated relief. “As soon as he spies you, he’ll send out all his strength to m-meet you in battle. To... to put a swift end to it with a great victory.”

“How can you be sure?” Stannis asked at once.

“I overheard many... many things as Lord Ramsay’s man. My lords—the Boltons struggled to win over the North. They’ve grown impatient.”

“The Roose Bolton I recall is anything but impatient. It’s far more likely I shall be forced to besiege him.”

“He cares more and more for how he’s regarded. Ever since he was named Warden, he’s been... he seeks legitimacy. There’s not going to be a siege... Please, believe me, you must defeat him in open battle.”

Stannis pursed his lips. “I wonder if I should take the word of a proven turncloak. A son of Balon Greyjoy who struggles to remember his own name, and whose heart and mind clearly remain in thrall to the dead bastard of another traitor.”

He watched as Theon gaped at him, unable to speak or defend himself. The man’s mouth worked uselessly, opening and closing again and again on a patchwork of missing teeth. He made a strangled noise, and appeared to be on the verge of tears.

Stannis looked away. “Well, I can’t imagine it would cost us very much should you prove to be wrong. We’ll merely look like fools, charging to meet nothing but a bare field and eighty-foot walls. The alternative...” He glanced at Greyjoy and motioned his hand to the side. “Back to the train with you. We’ll prepare as you say, but you’ll not be anywhere near to see it. You and Sansa Stark and the wounded. Pray it is mine own men who come to retrieve you at battle’s end, not Bolton’s.”

His scouts could only confirm so much. Winterfell lay ahead of them, they said, its people shut in behind the stout gates and double curtain walls. Bolton men could be seen standing watch on its western turrets, clearly waiting for his host to appear. But no human eye could see through those granite walls to the activity that lay within, so whether siege or battle awaited them none could say.

The king took good counsel no matter where it came from. He ordered every man in the vanguard and main to cut down a bough from the spruces, sentinels, and soldier pines that lay thick about them. These branches, still lush with greenery while other trees now stood bare at summer’s end, were to be carried in front of them as the army emerged from the wolfswood and came in sight of Winterfell. If Greyjoy spoke true, and it came to battle, the portable forest cover would serve to screen their numbers from the Boltons’ prying sight long enough to confuse and delay the enemy.

In battle, even the smallest advantage could turn the tide towards victory. And Greyjoy had spoken true.

Mid-morning, Stannis watched from some distance as Winterfell’s gates opened, pouring forth a stream of horses and men. They kept coming, men in Bolton colors and those of other houses recently sworn to their new liege. The enemy began to mill about and falter before the castle walls, undecided in their formation as he and his men kept coming as well, maintaining their cover.

By the time his vanguard finally threw down their branches and charged openly, Stannis knew he had more than a chance. It was the battle north of the Wall once more, his foes disorganized and wavering, not even united in purpose amongst themselves. As he led his main strength forward, he saw many of the northmen allied to Bolton lay down their arms and surrender, seeing his own northerners riding with him and finding themselves unwilling to shed a neighbor’s blood in the name of a traitorous, upjumped lord. Or perhaps they realized the day was lost; this was a king coming for them, after all. The only true king of this realm.

Bolton’s men gave a bloody fight still, being well-rested and strong compared to Stannis’s long-suffering soldiers. But the leech lord had miscalculated; had delayed too long. As the sun began to slant over a dwindling field, the fallen bodies littered across it were decorated with more flayed men than flaming hearts.

In the end it was his northmen who dragged Lord Bolton yet unharmed into Winterfell’s courtyard, the turncloak’s knees trailing in the frozen mud.

The king—weary, bloodied, triumphant—took his head in the yard with common steel.

He had barely finished wiping the blade, gritting his teeth to better bear the pain in his slashed leg, when the Stark girl came forward to kneel before him.

“All here know me to be Sansa Stark, trueborn daughter of Winterfell,” she pronounced, slowly but loud and clear enough. “My father, Lord Eddard Stark, lost his head declaring for your cause. Now you have bled for his home and mine. From this day, House Stark and all its vassals pledge our swords and fealty to you, King Stannis.”

_King Stannis_ , the other northerners muttered in echo, resting on their knees.

The flayed man banners were struck, and when the smoke of burning bodies cleared, at long last the direwolf was seen flying over Winterfell once more, austere and proud alongside his red-gold stag.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Strategy and warfare are not in my wheelhouse, so I sort of faked my way through parts of this. But hey, if the show can fudge these things as much as it does, I think I’m good. The scenario of Stannis’s men using forest cover to hide their numbers is an allusion* to Birnam Wood coming to Dunsinane—i.e., my smart-ass middle finger at Benioff, Weiss, & co. for relying on the last ten pages of _Macbeth_ to guide them through the end of Stannis’s arc instead of, y'know, _A Song of Ice and Fire_.
> 
> *ETA: I totally missed that Stannis actually uses this strategy to take Deepwood Motte in _A Dance with Dragons_. Man, have I even _read_ these books? Looks like I pulled a D &D myself!


	2. Command

Ravens flew from the castle in all directions, delivering the news of the Stark in Winterfell and renewing the call for fealty to the realm’s rightful king. Besides these, Stannis sent a bird to Dragonstone to apprise the castellan of his new position and seek updates on the dragonglass he wanted mined, and to Castle Black to inform Lord Snow of the situation with Winterfell and his sister.

To end this last missive, the king briefly considered asking for word of Lady Melisandre, who had surely returned to the Wall. She had seldom been absent from his side in the recent past, not unlike a shadow; he would not pretend he didn’t feel strangely bare without her there. It remained unclear to him why she had ridden off in his darkest hour despite all of her previous assurances to the contrary, but there was no doubt his refusal to burn Shireen had played a major part.

It appalled him to consider the suggestion in hindsight, even more so now that the battle was won. She had truly believed he’d go along with it. Was she mad? Had she been deceiving him all along?

He chased these disquieting thoughts from his mind—they mattered little now. He needed to focus his efforts instead on consolidating the North behind him. The rest of his letter to Jon Snow was given over to a reiteration of his offer to make the boy a Stark in name, although he was less vehement than before. From what he had seen, he could already grant that Lady Sansa herself was a sufficient ruler. She could not lead armies into battle, true, but what mattered more was that the North was more likely to rally behind a trueborn scion of Eddard and Catelyn than a mere bastard. And the lady was prudent, calm, and intelligent; a natural leader. She was firm when the situation required firmness and gentle otherwise. In the days that followed, Stannis found himself half-wishing he could bring the raven back, to strike his offer to Lord Snow from the scroll.

Messenger birds flew but one way, however, only knowing their first home. People knew better.

On the fourth day after the king’s banners had risen over Winterfell, Davos returned to him with his family safe and sound. Well—safe, at least. Shireen was both, and much gladdened to see him again.

“Father!” She embraced him freely, still every inch the young girl. “I knew you would win! Are you well?”

“Well enough—”

“Mother has been very ill. She doesn’t eat, and... I’m afraid for her.”

Selyse’s poor health had exacerbated during their traveling, and she now looked worse than Stannis had ever seen her, which was no light pronouncement. She was borne into the castle on the arms of two knights, simply nodding at her husband and taking little stock of anything else. Standing before the great keep with the household assembled, Lady Sansa shifted aside and bowed her head demurely as the queen passed without introduction.

“Have heart, Princess.” Davos had caught up to them. “Rest and proper food will surely set her right.” He smiled at Shireen and Stannis both, clearly pleased at their reunion, but when the girl was ushered off into the castle he only took a moment to smile at Stannis alone before sobering.

“Indeed, Your Grace, the queen no longer has much appetite,” he continued quietly as the people gathered in the courtyard began dispersing. “But it seems she also does not pray anymore.”

“She has lost faith in R’hllor, then. Is that so unusual? So bad?”

“It is only that I cannot remember a time when Her Grace was not... admirably devout. Forgive me, I’m sure you know this well, but it was faith she turned to time and again when misfortune struck the two of you. After Lady Melisandre’s abandonment... I fear she has only despair now.”

“Despair? We’ve won Winterfell and find ourselves in favorable circumstances for once. Apart from my lady’s health, I would think these are grounds for counting her god’s many blessings.”

“Still, she is troubled...” Davos trailed off worriedly.

“Unless you would have the red woman return after all, Davos, leave your concerns unspoken until the queen has had time to recover here in some comfort.”

“Of course.” Davos took a breath. “There is a second matter, Your Grace.”

-

The Hand of the King wore no badge like her father had as far as Sansa could tell, but then again, the king lacked for a crown as well. And just as one didn’t need the evidence of a golden circlet and velvet finery to distinguish Stannis’s authority over his men, it was clear enough from Davos Seaworth’s familiar way with the king that he was held in the closest confidence, regarded more highly than any other man in his service. Besides this, Sansa noticed the famed missing fingertips of the former smuggler as she approached and at once knew who he must be.

“The Lady Sansa Stark, I take it?”

“Lord Seaworth. I’m pleased to welcome you to Winterfell.”

“Thank you, my lady. You’ve joined us at just the right moment. On our journey here, my men stumbled upon two people seeking an audience with both you and King Stannis.” He turned to the king. “They remain by the gatehouse with the remainder of the guard awaiting your command. We had some... difficulty with them, as they refused to be parted with their arms at first.” Stannis shifted on his feet, impatient for the full story, but Davos continued cautiously. “It is interesting. The lady names herself Brienne of Tarth, and carries Valyrian steel—”

“Lady Brienne?” Sansa said, surprised.

Both men looked askance at her. “Do you know this woman, then?” said Stannis, narrowing his eyes at her. “She is of Tarth, a stormlander.”

Sansa reddened slightly, both due to his sharp scrutiny and in recalling the tense circumstances under which she’d met Brienne before, while she was still under Littlefinger’s care. She relayed the story to the king and his Hand quickly.

“I remember her now. A woman warrior. She was loyal to Renly and was at our parley. Along with your mother.” Stannis spared a nod for Sansa. “Who is the other?”

“Podrick Payne, a young squire.”

“My lords, I don’t think they mean me harm,” Sansa put in. “Podrick is a gentle lad, and Lady Brienne told me she swore a vow to my mother. She wanted only to take me under her protection when I was with Littlefi—Lord Baelish.”

“Has she come to whisk you away from beneath _my_ treacherous nose, then?” Stannis scoffed.

It was, in fact, why Brienne had come. She stated her intentions with dogged self-righteousness before the group in Winterfell’s great hall.

“Lord Stannis is not a man to be trusted, my lady. He is a killer. A murderer.”

Before Stannis could speak a word of angry defense, Sansa responded. “What man in these times is not a killer? All men are killers. I understand _you_ are a killer. Killers I trust; it’s men who toy with the lives of others whom I cannot trust. Everything I’ve seen tells me that King Stannis is an honorable man. He won’t hurt me.”

“Honorable? I tell you, King Renly was murdered by the shadow of this man, this kinslayer. I saw it with my own eyes. I swore to take vengeance. For your part in securing Lady Sansa’s home,” she said, addressing Stannis now, “I am willing to give you the honor of death by single combat, though it’s less than you deserve for your crime.”

She started removing her gauntlet but had no audience in the king; he had abruptly risen to his feet and began to pace the length of the table despite the unsteadiness of his still-healing leg. Meanwhile, Lord Seaworth’s voice rang out sharply. “I tire of reminding you, my lady. If you would hurl treasonous offenses at the king, you will still address him as ‘Your Grace.’ He is your sovereign.”

“Forgive me, ser, but I don’t recognize him,” she responded, tossing her gauntlet between them. He appeared to take no notice. “Renly was the rightful king.”

Stannis paused and turned his head towards her in disbelief. “Rightful?” he hissed, and shook his head. “By what right did Renly crown himself before his elder brother?”

“He was the best of all of you. He would have been the greatest king.”

“Would have, should have. It’s all folly. Kings are not chosen on merit, or the will of the people. Were that so, Aerys would have been usurped half a heartbeat into his reign. As it happened, it took years for Robert to declare his rebellion. Would you have the realm be at war from summer to winter, sunrise to sunset? Because I assure you, were kingship a question of worth, the bloodshed would never end. History has shown it time and again. It’s the _rule of law_ that keeps order in this world. The elder brother before the younger. Due punishment or the Wall. Four fingertips and a knighthood. Every man or woman can only do his duty, and in pursuing the throne, I was trying to do mine. I still am.”

“How is working blood magic to murder your own brother anything like duty?”

The king brought his fist down on the high table once, hard, then withdrew it just as quickly. “Do not presume to lecture me on duty! Duty to one’s family, duty to the realm... I’ve chosen before and will choose again. What do you know of that choice? You forget, Brienne of Tarth,” he said, stepping down from the dais to meet her eye-to-eye at last, “I was his brother long before he was anything to you. I loved him, and looked after him as a boy when the combined power of the Reach held us under siege in our home for a year. After our parents, I was Renly’s first protector. I would have named him my heir—over mine own child.”

Stannis returned to the dais, pacing once more. “Yet he defied me, sought to destroy me... Very well, I destroyed him instead. It was blood magic. I’ve never spoken of it to anyone but Davos and do not wish to speak of it again. I am finished with the red woman’s unnatural witchcraft. She saw true in the flames, yes, but the rest of her works availed me nothing but strife, two steps backward for every step forward. Magic can only betray you...”

He walked on for several moments longer in complete silence. Then: “I have explained myself, and so have you. As an intruder on these lands and a treasonist bearing Lannister gold and Valyrian steel of unknown provenance, you and your squire will have little say in what follows.

“First, I will not engage you in single combat. It’s foolish, and I don’t have time for it. You will forsake any intent to seek vengeance on me for Renly; he is dead, and the blood has long since dried.”

Brienne’s face was as stone and her eyes wide with disbelieving anger, but she held her tongue, watching Stannis walk round to take his chair again.

“Second, the Lady Sansa. You vowed to her mother that you would see her girls safe. Though you seem not to believe it, Lady Sansa is safe. Indeed, you stand in her hall. What of the other—?” He turned to Sansa.

“Arya,” she supplied.

“Lady Arya—” Brienne faltered, betraying her hesitation for the first time. “I have seen Lady Arya. I encountered her traveling with Sandor Clegane near Saltpans, my lady, before I turned north to look for you. I fought the Hound and killed him, but Arya would not... She would not accompany me. She disappeared.”

“Arya lives? Truly? And Sandor Clegane... dead...” Sansa too became discomposed for the first time, clutching her hand tightly against her chest. Her heart was full of conflicting emotions, dredging up memories of King’s Landing that for long weeks had lain dormant in the bitter cold of the North.

Stannis glanced at her, then sharply questioned Brienne.

“Lady Arya disappeared, you say. Between you and this poxy squire of yours, you couldn’t keep an eye on one young noblewoman. How long ago was this? Do you have any idea where she went? Could she have taken ship from Saltpans?”

“It was several months ago—four, maybe five. And I don’t know.”

Lord Davos cleared his throat. “Your Grace, I can send word to acquaintances I have in that port and others along the coast, asking if they’ve seen the girl. Does she take after your mother in appearance like yourself, my lady?”

“No, Arya is brown-haired, with a long face like my father’s. It used to remind me of a horse. And her eyes are grey.”

“She carries a small sword, as well. She calls it—”

“— _Needle_.” Sansa and Brienne spoke as one.

“Very well. We’ll await word from your old smuggler friends, Onion Knight. In the meantime... Lady Brienne. You have come here not only to challenge me but also to protect Sansa Stark. I refuse your challenge and daresay Lady Sansa hardly needs your protection thanks to my actions. It is of little consequence to me whether you remain with us or leave—so long as you’re a guest here you shall be denied arms and watched closely. But I’ll allow your presence because you are of noble birth, the Evenstar’s only daughter and heir, and because your oath to Catelyn Stark is of an honorable nature. Does the Lady of Winterfell object to any of this?”

“Your Grace is reasonable.”

“The lady deems me reasonable. So now it is you who must choose, Brienne of Tarth. You will forswear one vow or the other today. In staying, you stand ready to retrieve Lady Arya upon notice and may protect Lady Sansa in her own home to whatever degree she might wish. But you must acknowledge me as your king and end your foolish quest for vengeance. If such a proposition is so very abominable to you, I shall have you and your squire thrown out of this castle, whereupon I presume you’ll spend the rest of your days searching for Arya Stark in all the wrong places, blinded as you are by your desire to kill me.

“So, tell me. Who will you choose? Two living, breathing daughters of Catelyn Stark or one dead brother of mine?”

Brienne swung her gaze wildly between Stannis and Sansa, torn between hatred and duty. At her side Podrick Payne was throwing her desperate sidelong looks, clearly with the king, but the lady warrior ignored him.

Sansa leaned forward, eager to reach a resolution to this. “My lady, please choose well. I want peace, but more importantly I want to find my sister. All of my siblings. You must have the honor of bringing her home, to remedy your previous failure. And in the meantime I would have you as my sworn shield, or,” she glanced at Stannis, “if His Grace will still not permit you a weapon, my companion. Perhaps because he’s a man he doesn’t fully understand, but even under my own roof I fear for my safety. It was here that I was... Ramsay...”

She struggled to put into honest words the nightmarish abuse he’d visited upon her, but her heart rebelled against her, trying to shield her from the shame of admitting what she had allowed upon herself, the pain of even remembering. _Will it ever fade? Get any easier?_ It was several long moments before she could recover enough to speak.

“It shouldn’t be a secret to anyone that here I was taken violently by a man who was known to all as my husband. Every night. Everyone knew. And yet it was allowed to pass. I was a wretched prisoner in my own home. I needed a protector then, Lady Brienne, and need one still.”

Revulsion and anger played out with varying degrees of control across the faces of her listeners. Sansa saw that Brienne in particular looked as broken and ashamed as she had when admitting Arya had escaped her.

“Bolton’s bastard is dead, my lady,” came Stannis’s voice, rough from subdued volume. “He can harm you no longer.”

“I am so very grateful for that, Your Grace, beyond the telling... but again, you don’t see fully. This is a world of men we live in, and although I am the Lady of Winterfell in truth now, I’m also playing host to an entire army, larger even than the Boltons’. Strange men walk my halls day and night, and still more camp outside my walls. No doubt I am more protected by my birth and position than others, but these things availed me nothing with Ramsay. I’m no longer the happy, innocent maiden I was during my childhood here. Distrust and fear... and shame have made their home in me, and I am so tired of watching my back...”

King Stannis took a breath to respond, his brow furrowed, but Brienne overtook him. She had stepped forward urgently, yet formally.

“Lady Sansa, from this day you have my service, as completely as did your lady mother. I shall be your sworn shield and protect you from these horrors whether it be by sword or my bare hands. And... if that means taking Stannis Baratheon as my king, that is what I will do.”

“Very well,” said Stannis slowly, after Brienne’s words had settled. He glanced at Sansa, who nodded, and got to his feet again. “You and your squire both, kneel before me.”

Podrick scrambled forward to take a knee, but Brienne remained upright. “I have no sword to swear by, my lor—” she paused, then swallowed, “—my liege.”

Stannis snorted. “What need do you have of a sword? I’m not asking you to fight for me. I only require your loyalty and obedience. I will see to it that you’re properly armed to guard Lady Sansa; you may pledge your sword to her then. In the meantime, _kneel_ , my lady.”

Brienne turned her gaze to the floor and knelt.

So too did Walda Bolton and Theon Greyjoy, now Winterfell’s two noble hostages. The Red Wedding would not be forgotten, the king said, and Walder Frey’s time would come, but in his mercy he would allow Lady Walda’s babe to live. He or she was to be raised as a ward of the castle much like Theon had. But if either man or woman demonstrated the slightest hint of treachery in word or deed, the child would be the first to die, and their heads would follow.

The terms were delivered to the quivering pair the following morning, and Sansa took satisfaction in seeing their fear and subsequent relief. It was only fitting; she fancied it was her own consult with King Stannis that had shifted his judgment in their favor. She hated the Boltons and Freys with a fire in her soul, but her long memory of Tyrion Lannister’s kindness—proof that one was not necessarily beholden to the sins of one’s family—had spurred her to petition the king for the life of Walda and her unborn child. True, the woman had been complacent, airy, and far too pleased with her position for the time that she’d been Lady of Winterfell, but she had also never been unkind to Sansa. Some people were weaker than others, lacking the strength to speak out against cruelty. Still, the gods decreed that this was no preventative to the simple privilege of life.

As for Theon, Sansa had believed him when he told her he didn’t kill Bran and Rickon, and she believed him still. For that, the fact that he had effected their escape from the Boltons, and his considerable suffering, she implored Stannis to spare him.

(She did not mention to the king that Theon was now the only familiar face left to her in all of Winterfell. But that too weighed heavily on her mind. Broken as he was, and partly responsible for the current state of the castle, Theon was still the one person who had known her as a child, before... before everything that had happened. It was easy to feel lost and overwhelmed these days, when she looked about to see former Bolton servants and the king’s men traversing the castle she’d known to be her home, and she wondered at how everything had come to this. But then Sansa would see Theon there among them, and she would remember: Here was someone else who understood. Who knew how simple it had been before. How very far away that time now was.)

She couldn’t say whether her appeals had swayed King Stannis for certain, since his decision was only sealed after Lord Davos reminded him that Theon was the rightful heir of the Iron Islands, an invaluable hostage. Besides this, the king had already noted that were it not for Theon’s unsolicited counsel, Roose Bolton would very likely have surprised his army outside Winterfell. But as Stannis’s words of judgment rang out in the great hall for all to hear, included among them was the acknowledgment that Theon had not murdered Bran and Rickon, and that the boys might still live.

-

The days that followed were full of waiting. Waiting for the northern lords to respond, as well as Jon. Waiting for word from Lord Davos’s friends in the Narrow Sea. Waiting for Queen Selyse to recover from a fever that did not seem to have any mercy.

She was given the warmest, most comfortable chamber in the keep, that which was meant for the Lady of Winterfell. Sansa, having previously known it as only her mother’s, had been quick to give it up. But it seemed of little comfort to the queen. On occasion, she would throw open all the windows in the room, flooding it with freezing air as she insisted she could not feel the cold. But in truth she must have, for it would inevitably worsen her condition. It sent the maesters into fits of vexation, and no doubt the king as well.

Sansa knew little of healing and so could not be of much further help. She could, however, offer the Princess Shireen distraction from her mother’s illness. The girl had not known the company of other noblewomen for many months but was sweet and enthusiastic with Sansa and Walda. In the afternoons, when there was a lull in Sansa’s duties, they would all sit together and engage in activities Sansa used to relish. She still did, in fact—sewing, singing, and reading aloud were a welcome respite from the responsibilities she now carried at every other hour of the day.

Shireen enjoyed the reading most, and even Lady Brienne, who usually chose to stand guard outside during their other activities, came to sit in the room with them as they read aloud from various histories and chronicles. The princess had a collection of her own books that had traveled with her all the way from Dragonstone, but she already knew them much too well. She was thrilled, therefore, the first time Sansa took her to see the remnants of the library.

The collection, although drastically reduced by the fire and subsequent flooding caused by Ramsay’s sack of Winterfell, was a wonder to Shireen. She claimed to not know very much about the history of the North, being more familiar with Dragonstone’s many volumes on the dragons of Valyria and the Targaryen conquest. Accordingly, Sansa walked her through the length of the library, offering her best overview of the children of the forest and the First Men, of Bran the Builder, who lived in the Age of Heroes, and the Kings in the North. She wished she could remember more of what Maester Luwin and Old Nan had taught her of the histories.

The princess listened politely all the while, and Sansa realized after a time that she was only holding back her usual fount of questions because she already knew just as much, if not more, than Sansa on these subjects. So, sensing the girl was eager to seize any one of these books and dive into reading alone, Sansa invited her to take her pick from the collection.

As Shireen immediately doubled back to where they had passed the tomes on the old Kings in the North, the door to the library opened across the room. The back of King Stannis’s head appeared, and his voice was heard speaking irritably to Brienne.

“What kind of king do you take me for? I only want to speak with her. And—that’s the only thing I shall ever want from her, so stop fearing for her virtue like some sour septa with me and leave us be. That’s a command, not a request.”

He then strode in, letting the door fall shut against Brienne’s sullen, “Yes, Your Grace.”

“Lady Sansa, so I’ve found you at last. Ah, Shireen.”

“Your Grace.”

“Father, Lady Sansa’s just shown me the library,” said Shireen, hugging an enormous book to her chest. “It’s bigger than Dragonstone’s, isn’t it? And the one at Castle Black?”

“Yes, I imagine so.” Stannis spared a glance at his surroundings. “I need a word with Lady Sansa. Tell my guard outside to take you to your chamber. It’ll be dark soon.”

Shireen went gladly, bearing her book along like a piece of treasure. Sansa for her part was sorry to see her go; it was one thing to face the king in a room with other people, but alone, he still intimidated her.

“What can I do for you, King Stannis?”

“I’ve had my first replies from your northern lords. Deepwood Motte and White Harbor write to aver their fealty to you and House Stark, but to me...” The king gritted his teeth. “They remain chary. They agree to come at next full moon, but make no mention of swearing anything to me, nor even do they address me as they should in their letters. Tell me, are Glover and Manderly particularly insubordinate or are all northerners this difficult?”

He was fixing her with his hard, unmerciful stare, but Sansa heard an increasingly familiar hint of complaint in his voice and suspected it was nothing more than that. “Houses Glover and Manderly are among Winterfell’s stoutest allies. If they come, they will hear me and lend you their aid if I command it.” Or so she hoped. Sansa tried to project confidence into her voice to make up for the lack in her heart. She was the Lady of Winterfell now—they had to listen to her, didn’t they?

“ _If_ you command it? You shall, because it is my command to you.”

“When I command it, then,” she agreed, bowing her head.

Stannis pursed his lips and cast his gaze about once more. The library was rather in disarray, books roughly sorted into stacks according to how much damage they had taken, or by subject or age. The maesters Roose Bolton had brought in to replace Luwin had not devoted much time to sorting it all out yet, having been more in demand as healers, draughtsmen, scribes, and raven-keepers.

The king must have been thinking along similar lines. “Have you sent for a new maester?” he asked, glancing at her.

“Of course.” One of Sansa’s first actions as lady had been to send a raven to the Citadel. She knew Bolton’s maesters had been given little choice in serving him, but she could not help mistrusting them a little still. Besides, they needed to return to the smaller holdfasts they were originally sworn to. A new face was sorely needed, one equal to the needs of a vast place like Winterfell.

“Good. Three maesters, Bolton brought, and none of them seem to have done any good for my wife. And I may have need of this library before long. Castle Black’s was slow to reveal any guidance regarding how to fight the Others. Even with the damage incurred, one might still have better luck here.”

_The Others._ Though Sansa had heard him mention these creatures before, a chill ran down her spine again as powerful as any produced by the stories Old Nan had told in her childhood. “You refer to the White Walkers.”

“They are called that sometimes.”

“Do you know for certain that they truly come, Your Grace? You said... ‘Death marches on the Wall.’ What do they want from us?”

“I don’t know what they want, other than to see us all destroyed. But the Lady Melisandre told it true. A man of the Night’s Watch has seen them with his own eyes. Killed one, with a dragonglass dagger. Jon Snow vouches for this man, and I questioned him myself. It is enough.”

“Then do you still plan to march on King’s Landing? What if they attack the Wall, and get through?” Sansa had never been as kind as she should have been to her bastard brother, but now he was the only family left to her who lived with a certainty. The thought of Jon so close to death on the Wall sent a desperate fear through her equal to that provoked by this talk of White Walkers.

The king was frowning. “The throne is mine by rights. I’ve risked all for it and will continue to do so, as Robert’s heir. But I won’t forget the Night’s Watch, no. When I’ve won my seat in King’s Landing, I’ll be back out of it soon enough to take up the fight against the Others. That too is the duty of a king... I care not what the prophecies may or may not call me.”

He paused for a long moment, staring out of the diamond-shaped window of the library tower. His frown had only deepened. Sansa wasn’t privy to these prophecies he spoke of, but she surmised they must be the work of the red priestess who, until recently, was said to have been the king’s closest adviser.

“Few of these creatures have been seen,” Stannis continued, his voice low as if speaking to himself. “And so far beyond the Wall that there should be time yet... Even now the North can field more men than the rest of the realm combined, and with that power behind me I should be able to take the throne easily. Then, no less than the entire Seven Kingdoms will join me in defending against this darkness. But I _must_ have the North.”

He pinned her with his gaze once more. “And _you_ will deliver it to me.”

Sansa felt his stare like the weight of a hundred wayns. He was placing so much responsibility on her, making it sound as if the fate of his campaign, the Wall, and the entire realm rested on her ability to persuade the remaining northern lords. Could she do it? It didn’t matter; she must. But they _were_ a difficult bunch. She had watched her father’s whiskers turn prematurely grey in his years of dealing with them, and Roose Bolton, traitor though he was, had fared no better. Why couldn’t Stannis shoulder the weight for himself and make his will be done? He was the king, and if he was truly a worthy one he should be able to succeed without relying on Sansa, who was only a woman.

She could not even voice these objections to him, timid as she was. When she only swallowed and assented, he nodded—and it was such a dismissive motion, delivered with the barest of glances, that it raised her pique all over again.

“Your Grace,” she said loudly, interrupting his exit. He already had the door partway open to leave but turned back around, surprised yet wary.

“My brothers,” she continued determinedly. “Theon says that Bran and Rickon escaped, and I must find them. Will you not spare some of your men to seek them out? It can only be to your benefit to recover more of us Starks.”

_And mine_. _I’ll have my brothers back, and you’ll stop asking so much of me_.

Across the room, she thought Stannis looked rather discomfited. “And where would my men begin? In the wolfswood? Should they follow the White Knife all the way to the Narrow Sea, or search every barrow high and low? What you ask is impossible, my lady. The North is vast, as you well know, and your brothers might not even be within its bounds still. They might be across the sea. They might be dead.”

“You won’t even try?” Sansa dared to protest, even as her throat began to constrict in grief and frustration.

“I haven’t even the men to spare,” the king retorted testily. “My forces were severely weakened by our blows with the Boltons. All so I could free Winterfell, all so _you_ could be restored to your birthright. Will you not consider those services enough for the time being? Besides, now that Greyjoy has publicly confessed the truth of what happened here when he took this castle, everyone down to the smallfolk will know to look for two lost young lordlings and their beasts. The truth of their whereabouts will be revealed as well in time, I’m sure.”

He considered her for a moment longer, and she returned his gaze long enough to see a small grimace pass unexpectedly over his face. But he soon straightened his expression and said no more, only offering a curt nod in farewell. Then he was gone. Sansa went on staring through the open door to find Brienne looking at her curiously.

If only she could send Brienne off to find her brothers! But it had been years since they were last seen, not mere months as with Arya. She was forced to admit to herself that the king was probably right about Bran and Rickon. For now, it was impossible.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “I was his brother long before he was anything to you” - a line spoken by Doran in the show that I thought was equally worthy of Stannis.


	3. Shifts

Manderly and Glover were only the beginning. Nearly two weeks after Stannis had issued forth his summons to the lords of the North, the drought of correspondence suddenly broke, and ravens began arriving daily. From Torrhen’s Square, Karhold, Last Hearth, and even Bear Island came letters full of loyal words for House Stark, and whatever space was left to spare on each scroll was given to cautious acknowledgment of “Lord Stannis.” None of them outright promised him the fealty and service he was due as king, but they were not ungrateful.

More importantly, they would come. That was all that really mattered to Stannis. He couldn’t expect to win anybody’s loyalty through ink and paper—his efforts directly after Robert’s death towards spreading word of Joffrey’s bastardy had taught him that.

The bird from distant Greywater Watch reached him last. Lord Howland, who led the crannogmen of the Neck, sent his regrets: he would not be joining them at Winterfell at the full moon. House Reed remained true to the Starks, he wrote, but circumstances forced him to remain in the Neck and continue serving the needs of its people. Grateful for the ousting of the Boltons nonetheless, he wished Stannis all good fortune in his quest for the throne, for the Lannisters were no friends of the North either. But in the end, Reed demurred just as all the other lords had in recognizing the king.

This vexed Stannis. He stalked through the castle, this time with Davos in tow, to find Sansa Stark once more and demand an explanation. What privilege did Howland Reed think he possessed, to decline a summons from the king?

She did not know.

“Lord Howland was one of my father’s closest allies. No doubt since his death, the crannogmen have become much more cautious. They are a difficult people to stir at the best of times, Your Grace. And the Neck is so far.”

“No further from here than Castle Black. The journey can be made in as little as a fortnight.”

“If the weather holds, that’s true,” Sansa allowed. “But maybe it’s better that they remain where they are. I heard Roose Bolton say that when my brother Robb called his banners to march south, he didn’t take any of the crannogmen with him. They stayed behind to defend the Neck. Everyone knows you can’t hope to pass through the swamps and bogs without their leave. As long as Lord Howland holds the Neck, our enemies can’t enter the North on foot.”

Stannis crossed his arms over his chest and exchanged a glance with Davos beside him. The lady made a good point. Certainly, his remaining men were in no fit state to confront another army anytime soon. They could easily withstand a siege behind Winterfell’s walls, but Stannis had no intention of wasting that kind of time, not with his throne still in enemy hands—and winter on their doorstep.

“Well,” he said, “perhaps our problems might be mutually solved when I march south to the Neck myself. It’s looking more and more likely for every day that passes without a raven from Jon Snow. Your bastard brother swore to return my ships to me after his journey to Hardhome— _why_ does he not send word that he’s returned?”

“It cannot be an easy journey, Your Grace,” Davos interjected. “He’ll have many thousands of wildings on his hands. It’s likely he’s only been delayed.”

Stannis waved this off. “Whatever the cause, if I cannot sail straight to King’s Landing, I must march, and when I pass through the Neck I shall have these bog lords bend the knee. They’ll have no need to stand in defense any longer; they’ll join me in the fight to take the capital and end this War of Five Kings for good. I must unite the realm before the true enemy falls upon us.”

If it was to be a march, he meant to leave the queen and princess behind at Winterfell under Lady Sansa’s charge as Wardeness of the North. Providing he didn’t die in the attempt to take the throne, they would be another reason for him to keep his promise to return north after being invested in the capital, as if his word and the threat of the Others weren’t enough.

It would be simpler if he had his ships. His family could sail south with him, then wait offshore until he took King’s Landing. Or they might even find refuge on land across the Narrow Sea, someplace peaceful where the weather was fair.

For Selyse’s condition was not improving in the bitter cold of the North. The heated spring water running through the pipes in her chamber was apparently wasted on her; she yearned instead for the bite of winter air, and had been regularly throwing off her furs and unlatching the windows. Whenever he or the maesters demanded an explanation for this behavior, his wife would only respond that the cold didn’t daunt her, that it gave her as much strength as the fire in the hearth.

The windows were bolted shut now, on his orders, and the queen spent her days in bed sweating out her fever. At the maesters’ repeated urging, Stannis had finally consented to the use of leeches as well. It disturbed him, both as a reminder of the illusions Melisandre had wrought on him and for Roose Bolton’s infamous association with the creatures. But Selyse gladly took to her twice-daily leechings, even if the practice seemed to make little improvement on her health.

“Bad blood. That’s what ails me,” she said to him one day. He’d thought her asleep, and had entered the chamber quietly to inspect the newest set of herbs the maesters had laid out to prepare a remedy.

He turned to look at her. She might have been a ghost, her face deathly pale and sheened over in a thin sweat. “If it were bad blood, the leeches would have cured you of that by now,” he responded. “Your blood is as fit as mine. You’re of noble stock, after all.”

“Not as noble as yours. No matter how much I bleed, it will remain unchanged... insufficient. _You_ have the king’s blood, Stannis. You, and our child.”

“Don’t speak to me of that,” he said sharply. “It makes no matter. We’re past the red woman’s blood magic. I am the king by blood, but there’s nothing magical or rare about it. And you are the queen. A simple fact.”

Her eyes were closed, and her voice lowered to a murmur. “A queen should make heirs... What sort of queen am I? What have I given you?”

“A daughter. A living, breathing child. She is my heir.”

“What sort of queen am I?” Selyse repeated, even quieter than before. “What sort of... What mother... would love a god better than... than...” She trailed off into a low moan, covering her face with a weak hand.

Stannis grimaced, inwardly cursing himself for the curiosity that had led him into this room. He stood watching Selyse as she lay there in misery for several moments, then approached the bed and the washbasin that had been set up beside it. With stiff, uncertain movements, he plunged a fresh washcloth into the cool water, wrung it out slightly, and ran it across the fevered skin of her forehead, pushing back her hair a little. He had not even done this on the many occasions she had lain weak during and after pregnancy, not with handmaidens or Maester Cressen always on hand to tend to his wife’s bedside. And not with his disappointment whenever she’d failed yet again to give him a son—even a child, until Shireen.

He felt no disappointment now. Only a sighing sort of frustration, and a heaviness that wouldn’t leave his brow. He thought it might actually be pity. Guilt, too, if he were to be fully honest with himself.

“You’re delusional with fever. I don’t know what else to do or say.”

He couldn’t decide if it was worse than when she’d been at her most religious, an equal kind of delusion. At least now there were no false gods in her heart telling her what to say and do and believe. Her thoughts—unsightly and self-loathing though they were—remained her own. On the other hand, she had been healthy and whole before losing her faith. And queenly in her way, a fitting complement to what little grandeur he could muster for his own royal office.

She opened her eyes and regarded him with a thin half-smile. “Disregard me. I won’t linger in this world much longer, but _you_ are meant for more.”

Stannis’s frown deepened. “What do you mean by that? You’ll recover from this.”

Selyse only shook her head.

“Tell me how the queen can be felled by something so ordinary as a fever.”

“I just know it. A few certainties are all I have left, Stannis. You are the king. I will not survive this. I’ll never give you a son. And you will win this war against the darkness. You were born to stand against the Others, to defeat them.”

He was struck silent for a long beat. “I thought you no longer believed.”

“I only believe in you.”

“I’m no god!” he growled, frustrated.

“No, of course not,” Selyse replied with her familiar calm, closing her eyes once more. She paused for several moments to cough, the fit sudden and violent, and then went on. “You’re only a man. But if there is any man who can wage war on an unstoppable enemy, it’s you. You are made of that stuff, I know it. The Lady Melisandre was right about that. My husband will save the realm. All the men, the women, the children... Our daughter, too. Her children and their children.”

Stannis was shaking his head. “I don’t know what makes you so sure. You don’t know that I’ll survive any more than you know that you’ll die. And you speak of our child... How will she get on without a mother? You cannot die.”

“She got on well enough for years without—without my—”

Coughing overtook his wife again, more severely than before. Stannis, feeling obliged to do something, laid his hand over hers on the bed and squeezed it until the spasm passed. Her skin was cold. He couldn’t remember the last time he had touched it.

“Perhaps she’ll gain a new mother after I’m gone,” she said, her voice tired but matter-of-fact still. “No, naturally you must wed again. A king must needs have an heir. You’ll want... a son.”

“I’ve named Shireen my heir. You know this.” Stannis let go of her hand suddenly and got up, feeling tired himself. “Enough. This discussion serves no purpose. The fever has clouded your mind and you don’t know what you say. You are my wife, the queen, and will remain so after you’ve recovered. I expect that to be soon. I don’t have time for this.”

Selyse nodded. “Then return to your duties, husband. I won’t keep you any longer.” Her voice was very faint, as if being carried off on a nonexistent wind.

“Are you not one of those duties?” he remarked, standing over her. He had meant that he didn’t have time for her illness to run its course at the sluggish pace it had taken so far, but to explain this fully seemed to him a waste of breath. Instead, he took the opportunity she gave him and, after a few more seconds spent hovering, made his much-longed-for exit.

-

As he stood before the funeral pyre a week later, Stannis stared unblinking into the flames and saw no visions of battles in the snow, of ancient enemies or glowing swords. There was only his shrouded wife, a flickering shadow amidst the fire and smoke.

A dark suggestion visited him, darker even than the already grim thoughts he had in mind. He knew Melisandre had powers of which he knew nothing, spells and rituals learnt in Asshai, that city of shadows, which she’d never had cause to demonstrate for him. With his help, she had birthed the demon that killed Renly. But could she command death using other means? What if there were slower, more distant ways? For instance, a curse that took the form of a fever, gradually killing the victim...

Selyse had never shown anything but unparalleled courtesy bordering on reverence to the red priestess, but if Melisandre wanted to strike at him, casting down an innocent was not beneath her. He now stood alone without a queen; while at least he still had Shireen, his position was undeniably weakened.

But what would such a stroke gain Melisandre? If she’d truly abandoned or lost faith in him, then there was nothing she could want of him, nothing that his desperation might avail her. He was certain she wasn’t a petty, worldly woman who would go to such lengths just to seek revenge for being disregarded. He couldn’t see how he might have wronged her, anyway—it was _she_ who had gone too far in threatening the life of his daughter, failing to offer any alternatives, and finally riding off without his leave.

No, he decided, Selyse had died of natural cause, the same as everyone but Renly. The red woman could bring shadow assassins into the world and read the future in her fires, but her magics undoubtedly had limits. Even the leeches were not as they had seemed—he was sure now that the whole ritual had been a trick, paid for by her gift of foresight, to convince him of the power of king’s blood. She had succeeded, too, when Robb Stark had died so suddenly and so soon afterwards that Stannis couldn’t conceive of any other way it could have happened.

Only Davos had kept his wits about him. Davos, whose clear, sober eyes had seen right through the deception and beyond to the real danger, written on plain parchment sealed with black wax.

The onion knight stood a little off to his right, hunched over slightly as he spoke to Shireen. His face was as gentle as the gloved hand that rested on her shoulder, and no doubt he was offering some words of comfort to the girl. If it were anyone else, Stannis might have begrudged him for the closeness he had cultivated with his daughter, but Davos he trusted to never overstep his bounds. The other man had been a father even before Stannis had met him and understood how to speak to children with softness and sympathy. If he could offer Shireen some small measure of that softness, so foreign to Stannis, then it was all for the good.

Stannis understood that it was much needed this day, however much distance Selyse had put between herself and their child, and was grateful to be relieved of the task of providing it. For was it not the duty of the King’s Hand to speak with the king’s voice?

The fire blazed on; it would take at least an hour more for it to finish making ash and bone of his wife. Until then, there was no need to keep everyone standing and shivering in the snow any longer. Stannis had only to nod to his left and right to dismiss most of those assembled in the yard.

As the crowd began to recede, a page came running from the direction of the keep, bowed before Davos, and whispered a few words to him. The Lord Hand straightened at once and looked up at Stannis.

“Your Grace, a letter has come from my wife in Cape Wrath. They’ve sent it on from Castle Black.” Davos spoke merely to inform him, with no expectation of being given leave to go read his letter. But he could not have belied the anxiousness in his face if he’d tried with all his power.

“Go, see what news your wife has to tell you. I’ll not keep you for the sake of mine.”

“I will only read it, and then return at once to see to the queen’s remains,” Davos vowed. He offered Shireen an encouraging last smile before leaving.

Together, father and daughter watched Davos’s back as he hurried off. Then Shireen, eyes still bright with tears she had yet to spill, turned her face back towards Stannis and said, “Do you think he’ll read it fast enough to make it back in time?”

Stannis only blinked and opened his mouth, surprised.

“I’m sorry,” said Shireen quickly. She sniffed. “I know I shouldn’t make jokes. Not with Mother...”

A snowflake drifted into Stannis’s mouth, and he snapped it shut, feeling undignified in every way.

“Perhaps not,” was all he could say.

Shireen became extremely quiet after that, and they resumed watching the pyre with only a handful of other mourners. Stannis was distracted from his previous thoughts now, wondering what his daughter might be thinking and feeling. While he didn’t disapprove of her trying to find levity during the funeral—life went on, of course—he did consider it important for her to keep up appearances as the princess. He hadn’t meant to censure her too severely, however, and hoped she hadn’t taken his response as a reprimand.

This was already a difficult day, after all. One only had one mother to lose, and although a long winter and an even longer summer had passed since Lady Cassana had drowned beneath the waves of Shipbreaker Bay, Stannis still remembered the moment of numbness, the realization that there was no real safety to be found in anything. Coupled with the loss of his father, the day his mother died was the day Stannis had become a man grown.

But Shireen still had a father. She was still a child, far from womanhood, and she still had him. That was enough, was it not? No matter how much attention she may or may not have received from her mother, it was not a complete loss so long as Stannis lived. Her innocence remained.

He looked askance at her, trying to determine from her face whether these conclusions were anywhere near the mark. He was perturbed to find that her melancholy had in no way lessened after the long hour they had spent observing the pyre. Besides brooding, Stannis himself had gone through waves of boredom and, alternately, irritation at the growing stiffness in his incompletely healed leg; he’d expected Shireen to be bored and fidgeting as well, especially given her age and distant relationship with Selyse. What was so consuming her with sadness?

He could hardly ask her outright.

He was still frowning at her, considering what to say, when she noticed his gaze. She chewed her lip for a bit and then spoke first.

“Mother isn’t going to be laid in the crypts, is she?”

“What, here?” Stannis said, taken aback. “Winterfell’s crypts are for the Starks.”

“I read they’re for the old Kings of Winter and the Kings in the North as well. I know it’s different from being king of the whole realm, but I thought since you _are_ the king, Father, and we _are_ in the North...”

“The North is not mine yet. Anyway, I can’t call myself the King in the North if I’m not _of_ the North. No, your mother’s bones will be buried in some quiet ground nearby. I would return them to Brightwater Keep, but...” He ground his teeth in unchecked chagrin. “If Lord Stark’s remains couldn’t safely make their way home, then I have little hope for my wife’s. Even by sea it would be a risk, and I refuse to pay for what should be free passage aboard some venal merchant’s ship.”

Shireen nodded in understanding. Her brief moment of curiosity dimmed back into melancholy again, and Stannis watched disconcerted as tears began to well anew in her eyes. Confused but feeling responsible for the change nonetheless, he hesitated, then laid a careful hand on her shoulder as he’d seen Davos do. It seemed to serve little purpose aside from causing her tears to fall more freely.

Stannis looked back towards the keep, hoping to see Davos returning, but the doors remained shut, the way clear. Either Lady Marya had much to say in her letter, or the Hand needed to improve his reading ability considerably if he was to be of any use to Stannis. Agitated, the king cast his gaze around the courtyard instead, one hand still gripping Shireen’s shaking shoulders.

Lady Sansa was one of the few who remained in observance of the funeral, as befitting her position. Stannis’s eyes glanced off her figure briefly, then darted back as he realized she was looking his way. They exchanged a wordless stare. Her eyebrows rose in recognition of his predicament, and Stannis mirrored the move, caught in a rare moment of supplication.

He breathed out a fog of air through his mouth when she began to move towards him and Shireen.

Sansa bestowed a sympathetic smile upon his daughter. “Princess,” she greeted, then looked up at Stannis to add, seemingly as an afterthought, “Your Grace.”

“My lady.”

“I’m sorry for your loss, princess. I didn’t get the chance to tell you earlier.”

“Thank you, my lady,” said Shireen in a quavering voice.

“I know mothers are the hardest to lose. When my mother died...” Lady Sansa paused, her face crumpling all of a sudden. She knelt down to meet Shireen’s eye level. “I’m a woman grown now, but I still miss everything about her. She used to brush my hair for me... and kiss me good night when I was being very good.”

“I don’t remember Mother ever doing that for me.”

Stannis heaved a short sigh of frustration, glowering down at Sansa for her carelessness. Selyse had not been known for her affection towards anybody, least of all her daughter. The lady heard him and glanced up, looking chastised.

“Forgive me, princess, I didn’t know the queen well. You must miss her, though.”

“I don’t know,” Shireen sniffled. “I just feel sad.”

Sansa joined their gloved hands. “That’s all right,” she said quietly.

The sound of footsteps pulled Stannis out of the rest of their conversation. He turned to see Davos returning and stepped away to meet him.

“What news from Cape Wrath?” he asked briskly.

“Marya and our little ones are well,” Davos told him as he resumed his place at the king’s side, sounding much relieved. “And our lands continue to provide for them.”

“Good. Any troubles in the area?”

Davos’s attention was not fully with him. By the direction of his gaze, Stannis could tell that he’d noticed Shireen and Sansa, who were still conversing quietly together somewhere behind him. “I’m talking to you, Onion Knight,” he growled, determined to keep to business for as long as possible while Shireen sorted herself out.

The other man’s gaze slid back to Stannis at once. “Yes, Your Grace.”

The Rainwood on Cape Wrath remained largely untouched by the war, he reported—little surprise, considering its geography and the fact that most of the lords and landed knights who held domain over it had given up their loyalty to the Lannisters after Blackwater. House Seaworth, among a few others, remained true to Stannis, but as the boy on the Iron Throne had not yet bestirred himself to round them up, the people of Cape Wrath remained peaceful amongst themselves so long as they minded their own lands. It was not like the riverlands, where men were said to maraud the ruined countryside, sucking every last drop of blood and gold from the smallfolk in the name of whichever king they proclaimed to serve.

Lady Marya worried what would happen when the Lannisters did turn their eyes south. House Seaworth, with its modest lands, only commanded a handful of men-at-arms, most of whom had already gone to fight for Stannis. Should war come to Cape Wrath, the remaining Seaworths would be practically defenseless.

“They’ll have to make their escape by sea, then,” said Stannis, nodding. “The rest of the stormlands are more or less lost to me, anyway; what difference does your keep make? Tell your lady to make ready for the likelihood. Decide on a safe port across the Narrow Sea—Braavos seems suitable. I may send Shireen there, if we’re able to sail. We’ll gain all of it back when the wars are over.”

Davos agreed, bowing his head, and they turned again to the fire.

Stannis knew that Davos had not seen his wife in years, since before Blackwater; they had not even been able to mourn Matthos together. His two remaining sons as well might be near unrecognizable to him by now. Yet, no matter how much time Davos spent away from them, Stannis was sure that the love they bore for each other would remain undimmed; that when they were reunited Davos would kiss his wife and his boys and hold them closer than ever before. It seemed so simple to Davos, bridging this chasm of lost time and eroded feelings. Was there some secret to it that Stannis had never discovered?

The fire began to burn low, and the Lord Hand was obliged to go help lay more wood on the pyre. Stannis remained where he stood with his thoughts and his aching leg, frowning deeply.

“Is everything all right, Your Grace?” came an uncertain voice.

“What?” the king snapped. “Oh, Lady Sansa. Yes. Why do you ask?”

“You look... Forgive me, you looked as if you were in pain.”

“I’m fine,” Stannis said, shifting at once onto his good leg. He saw Sansa following his movement with her eyes, but she said nothing else of it. Crossing his arms over his chest, he looked beyond her shoulder to Shireen, who, to his relief, had regained some of her usual disposition. “What did you say to my daughter?”

“Words of comfort, I hope.”

“I see. And did she confide anything to you?”

Sansa hesitated, her lips parting delicately in suspended thought. She remained guarded when she spoke.

“There was much about her relationship with Queen Selyse that I didn’t know before. Overall it seems to have been a rather... distant relationship.”

Stannis huffed. “I could have told you that.”

“Well, the princess is obviously sad to have lost her mother still... along with the hope of everything that only a mother could give her.” Sansa turned to observe the pyre with him. “A loving embrace, smiles and kisses, womanly secrets. Things that I had the happy privilege of knowing before I lost my own lady mother. I think Shireen wanted that, despite everything—any girl would. But you know,” she said, tilting her head subtly to eye him now, “she also mourns for the queen’s own sake. She said that it hurts to think that her mother lived and died so unhappily.”

Stannis stared at Lady Sansa for a long moment, then glanced past her again at Shireen. “What’s the use of happiness?” he said at last. “We all do what we must, whether we wish it or no. Only children can truly be happy.”

“That’s what I said to her,” Sansa replied. “That only children are happy. But I think she would believe it better if she heard it from her father.”

Ah, so that was her game. Stannis clenched his teeth a little, annoyed that Lady Sansa should have the nerve to nudge him, the king, to do anything. He was annoyed even further to realize that it was too sensible a suggestion to refuse—his pride was hardly worth neglecting Shireen’s peace of mind.

He drew himself up and nodded stiffly at Sansa. “My lady,” he muttered, and brushed past her.

This time, he scarcely hesitated before lowering his hand onto Shireen’s shoulder. Perhaps it did get easier, this. The words themselves did not follow half so easily, but then they never had for him and likely never would.

Fortunately, he had a patient daughter.

-

Nearly every night as of late, the king threw on his furs and his gloves and walked a restless circuit along the battlements topping Winterfell’s inner curtain walls. He rarely spoke to the guards but instead looked upon the kingsroad leading south, leading north, and at last upon the heavens above, where the moon grew fatter with each passing night. It had often seemed to be mocking him, its light only becoming brighter and more sure as his own uncertainty stretched out with the days of waiting.

Tonight the disk was brighter than ever, a mere sliver of shadow obscuring its leftmost edge; in a matter of days it would be full.

The letter had come much later than Stannis would have liked. Still, it was here, and seemed nevertheless to have arrived just in time.

Footsteps sounded on the nearest staircase, growing nearer, and in the next moment a familiar voice joined in.

“You sent for me, Your Grace?”

“My lord of Rainwood.” Stannis turned and drew out the sheaves of furled parchment from his cloak. He pointed at the half-moons of black wax on either end. “You’ll recognize the seal, I trust.”

Davos came closer and peered at it under the light of the brazier. “Night’s Watch,” he said, looking back up at Stannis. “Arrived today?”

“Just before sunset. Jon Snow has not forgotten us. Read it, Davos. It is a long letter, but read it aloud.”

He turned his head to stare out across the snowy fields as Davos took up the missive and cleared his throat. His onion knight read slowly, but his pace lent the words a sure weight which, added together with the familiarity of his voice, allowed Stannis to absorb the news once more as fully as possible—as it deserved.

“‘To His Grace. Apologies for the delay in reply. Much has occurred, and I beg your attention for this entire letter.

“‘First, I am most gratified to learn of your victory and that my sister Sansa has been rescued from the Lannisters and Boltons. I trust she is safe at home once more under Stark and Baratheon banners. I urge Your Grace to accept her as the Stark in Winterfell, not me. By right my father and Robb’s inheritance belongs to her. Sansa is a trueborn Stark and will unite the North. She will be brave and do what is right, for it is in her blood.

“‘I must bring your attention to more grave matters—the most grave. Your ships were essential at Hardhome, but many sailed back empty. The White Walkers and their army of dead came for us as we were negotiating our departure. Thousands of wildlings were left behind in the attack—we tried, but could not save them all. The Others raised them from the dead even before the warmth had left their bodies. I swear to you, I saw this with mine own eyes.’”

Davos looked up from the letter, fluttering slightly in his hands. “Your Grace—”

“I know. Go on.”

Davos swallowed, and lowered his eyes once more.

“‘Our dragonglass was lost during the escape. I beg you to send for more from Dragonstone at once. A moon’s turn has passed since the attack and we have had no further sign of the Others from the Wall. I believe they lie in wait to strike again, though I do not know when to expect them next. But I need not tell you what will happen if the Wall should fall. The Night’s Watch called upon your aid before, and you answered. It is not for the Watch that I send you these pleas now—it is for all the men, women, and children in Westeros.

“‘I do not even speak for the Watch anymore. I have been removed as Lord Commander and write to you of my own initiative. Alliser Thorne now leads the Watch and deeply mistrusts my word, no matter how many wildlings speak the same. I have been sent out of the way to garrison the Nightfort, a ruin.

“‘The Lady Melisandre advises me. She says you have little need of her at the moment, and although I was suspicious of her arrival and intentions at first, her presence suits both of our purposes well. I am grateful for her services.’”

Davos paused again to glance at Stannis, but seemed to know better than to speak up this time.

“‘There is one last matter of import. I have received hints of late that my half-brothers Bran and Rickon live. The signs are indirect, only relating to their direwolves, but I am certain the wolves are alive. It is no sure thing that my brothers are with them, but they are bound to their wolves as I am to Ghost. My sister Sansa will want to know this, whether she trusts my word or not.

“‘Bran is the older boy, and Summer is his direwolf. I cannot be certain of their whereabouts and only know that they must be somewhere in the North. Rickon is the youngest and named his wolf Shaggydog. They too are in the North. All the evidence I have seen tells me they have found refuge on the isle of Skagos. I would go to find them and bring them home safe were it not for my vows and the oncoming darkness. I must leave the decision to my lady sister.

“‘I implore Your Grace once more to act with all prudence and haste regarding everything I have written. I swear on the old gods and all my honor that what I say is the truth. I await your reply.’”

A cold wind tore around them in the long silence that followed, snapping their cloaks and burning their nostrils. The fire in the brazier flickered mightily but blazed on, thriving on the gust of fresh air.

“Honor,” Stannis rasped, shaking his head. “The honor of what? Half a Stark? A bastard? The boy has been stripped of his command by his own brothers. If they don’t trust him, why should I?”

“Your Grace, you said yourself the Watch is full of killers and rapists. I would take Jon Snow’s word over any of theirs in a heartbeat. You also said he’s as honorable as his father.”

“To a fault.”

“Yes, but in this it’s no fault. The boy wouldn’t lie. I cannot think of any reason he would.”

The king raised an eyebrow at Davos. “Lady Melisandre? He’s under her influence now. She advises him... whispers things in his tender young ear, I’m sure. A woman like that can make any man forget his vows.”

Davos hesitated. Stannis had him there, surely. The onion knight had always mistrusted—probably hated—the red woman. He would never knowingly come to her defense.

“Forgive me, Sire,” said Davos quietly, “but no, not any man.”

Gripping the weathered stone of the battlement, Stannis whipped his head towards Davos, angry at the implication that he alone had been weak— _continued_ to be weak, letting Melisandre hold power over his conscience and actions. But his Hand only offered a steady gaze in return, unflinching. He was as honest as ever.

At length, Stannis relented in his stare and turned back to face the winds that blew their way from the north.

“If he speaks true, then. The dead rise by the thousands and the Others grow in strength and boldness.”

“We don’t have enough time.”

Stannis closed his eyes, nodding, and tapped his clenched fist against a merlon. “I must have my throne, soon.”

“Your Grace, allow me to say that... perhaps you’re putting the cart before the horse.”

Davos had lowered his head humbly as he said these words, but his voice didn’t falter in its conviction. Stannis tilted his own head to the side, inquisitive. “Say what you will, Onion Knight. I didn’t name you my Hand so you could feed me empty courtesies.”

“To take the Iron Throne now, you’d have to convince the North to join you, then travel to the coast if your ships are returned or else march all the way to the capital by land, a journey of at least a month if we’re lucky. After that would be the battle, with our men tired and weakened by travel while the Lannisters and their allies have been resting all this time in the warmer south. If we should win, you then face the task of convincing the lords of the Seven Kingdoms that the Wall is under dire threat from unearthly foes.”

“There will be no convincing. I am king, I need only command it.”

“Of course, but you must allow that even the king is obliged to deal in negotiations and politics amongst his subjects. There would be a great deal to talk about and settle and arrange before setting off with an army for the Wall. By then, it could be too late.”

“We must bear the risk,” said Stannis, gritting his teeth. “I don’t see any better way.”

“I know that you’re trying to win the throne to save the kingdom. But this letter tells me it’s high time to look at things differently, shift course. You should be _saving the kingdom_ to win the throne. Forget King’s Landing for now—I think we should stay here, concentrate on rebuilding our strength and mustering the North for _this_ war. The lords will rally for Sansa Stark and fight beside you and Jon Snow.”

Stannis began to walk along the battlement, Davos attentively keeping pace. “What if it’s not enough men?” he said at length. “I could have the entire realm behind me and you tell me I should face an undead army with half that strength at best.”

“It has to be enough,” Davos pressed. “It must. The Night’s Watch held the Wall against a hundred thousand wildlings with only, what, a hundred men? And the wildlings—they’ll surely fight for you this time, if you make this your cause. They know what’s at stake as well as we do.”

“And the northerners? To them these creatures only exist in tales told by their wet nurses. You think they’ll agree to take up arms against an enemy they’re like to see before they believe?”

“I don’t know. I don’t know much about the enemy myself, but I know that if the Wall is lost, Westeros is lost. We’ll have to make them believe. Your Grace,” he said, the urgency in his voice rising when Stannis only shook his head doubtfully. It prompted the king to halt and bestow his full attention upon Davos.

“To choose this you’d be taking a chance as great as that involved in turning south to take King’s Landing. But it’s the right chance. The right thing to do. Isn’t it the foremost duty of a king to protect his people? You are the one true king. If birth and blood are not enough, _this_ is how you will win your throne.”

Stannis didn’t stir again after absorbing this, only looking thoughtfully over the parapet where they were facing north. His eyes scanned the trees that grew thick in the distance, the land that began to give way to low hills and then, much further away, to mountains. He tried to imagine an army of dead things emerging from the woods, creeping over the hills and dragging their rusted blades in the snow. Hundreds of thousands, they were said to number. They would turn the snowy ground black with their swarming bodies and leave it blood-red behind them. And the Others... He could not picture them. What did demons made of ice and snow look like?

Stannis thought he could imagine what they felt like. They would feel like winter, and death.

“If I survive, Davos. That’s how I would win my throne if I survive. But if I should die, I’d die forgotten. A king only in blood and in name, not in truth.”

“You could die trying to take the throne now, Your Grace,” Davos reminded him. “But if you should die at the Others’ hands... it could only happen at the very end, when there’s no hope left. And none of our kind left to remember or forget anything.”

Stannis smiled grimly at Davos. He was right, there.

Certainly, Stannis had made it this far against all manner of odds. It wasn’t luck. Otherworldly or no, these new foes would not have it easy against him. He would not allow it. He was the king of these seven kingdoms, and even if he failed, he would fight to the bitter end—give it all his very last and then some.

Selyse’s words returned to him now, so full of certainty. _You will win this war against the darkness... If there is any man who can wage war on an unstoppable enemy, it’s you. You are made of that stuff._

How could she have known? How could anyone say how things would end when they’d barely begun? It had been deathbed bravado, Stannis supposed, nothing more. Would that he could believe her truly.

The moon drifted behind a curtain of clouds, taking its considerable light from the world with it. Stannis turned his back on the parapet and cast his gaze over Winterfell’s looming towers and shadowed grounds.

“Our time may be running short,” he said, “but either way, we still have the northern lords to contend with. In a few days’ time we shall take the measure of them and find out whether they can see as much sense as you, Davos. Now take your leave, my lord. The night is upon us.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks everyone for your patience... This chapter was tough, especially trying to handle Selyse with some dignity. Can't say that I managed it, but the main ship in this story must sail (soon! I swear’t).
> 
> Marya: I think it was mentioned on the show once that Davos has a wife, so hell yeah, I’m running with it. I had to give Davos at least two of his boys as well. The man has SEVEN in the books, pls.


	4. Proposition

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Good lord, it’s an update.
> 
> The awkward mishmashing of book and show canon continues apace. Do ask if you get lost somewhere between the two, because as much as I'd like to explain it all here, this chapter is much, much too long already.

Sansa had been awake long before the knock came at her chamber door, interrupting her brooding over the dreams that had woken her. Yet the serving woman who entered bringing a ewer of water and some breakfast had already gone before it occurred to Sansa that she’d forgotten to thank her or, indeed, say anything at all.

She got dressed resolving to scrub from her mind the tricks and visions of sleep.

Opening her door again a little, Sansa called softly into the corridor, “Lady Brienne?”

The tall woman unfolded herself at once from the nearby bench. “I’m awake,” she replied in a rough voice, beginning to stretch. She wore her swordbelt and usual leather and mail, but Sansa was glad to see her divested of her distinctive armor. Brienne guarded her as diligently as any Kingsguard, only without six other brothers to share the burden of her watch. Sansa often found herself having to ease the duties Brienne had set for herself, which included the wearing of full armor at all times.

“Will you break your fast with me this morning? I’d rather not eat alone.”

Brienne squinted. “Is there something the matter?”

_A black, bubbling pool of water. That twisted smirk. Blades and bruises and my little brothers..._

“Just dreams,” she replied. A draft from the hall washed over her, making her shiver and draw her shoulders together. “Please, I’d like your company.”

“As you will, Your Grace.”

Sansa paused. “Oh, not you too,” she said, wincing, as Brienne came through the door.

“Sorry, my lady. I’ve just got so used to everyone else calling you that.”

“I know. But Stannis is the king, and if he heard _you_ calling me that, he might lose his patience once and for all.”

Brienne scoffed quietly at this, setting down her swordbelt. They sat and began laying into the boiled eggs, bread, and cheese that had been brought up.

“Any happenings in the night?” Sansa asked.

“Yes, in fact, Lord Manderly and his retinue have arrived at last. They were seen approaching a few hours after dusk and settled into the winter town for the night. I expect they’ll join us soon.”

“It’s a wonder they’ve taken so long. White Harbor isn’t nearby, but even the Karstarks were more timely than them.”

As soon as she said it, Sansa wished she hadn’t mentioned the troublesome Karstarks—it was far too early in the day. But too late: now, like relentless squatters, they returned to take up their undeserved place in her mind as they had for the past several days. Sansa’s appetite took a dive, and she sat nibbling moodily at a heel of bread.

At least Lady Alys was all right. There had been some tension between them at first, considering Robb had taken her father’s head. But the two young women, who were almost of an age with each other, had soon agreed to let the dead lie undisturbed and treat each other without ill will. Hence Sansa found Alys as agreeable as she remembered from harvest feasts past.

But the same could not be said of Alys’s great-uncle Arnolf and his son Cregan, both of whom had accompanied her. Father and son were ambitious, it was clear—they had the same glittering look of avarice in their eyes that Sansa recognized from her long acquaintance with Petyr Baelish. Their position was plain enough: since Alys had inherited Karhold from the late Lord Rickard and her slain brothers, her two kinsmen needed to plot marriage alliances if they ever hoped to be lords in their own right.

And what ambitious plots they had...

Oh, they hadn’t stated their intentions outright, but Sansa hadn’t spent all that time in the Red Keep without learning a thing or two about the underhanded ways of politics. Arnolf Karstark was too old and crooked-backed to wed, but he wanted Karhold, and the only way Alys might be removed was by marrying a lord whose nobility outranked hers. And what higher lord was there than the recently widowed Lord of the Seven Kingdoms himself, Stannis Baratheon? Sansa had at once seen through the old man’s persistent exclamations of avuncular regret, spoken within earshot of the king, that his pretty grandniece remained unwed and childless, her betrothed having fought and died bravely in the Whispering Wood. Frequent too were his remarks lamenting Queen Selyse’s recent passing.

Cregan, his son, was still more transparent. A rather stale man already past fifty, he had made himself known to Sansa from the start, smiling at her with whatever charm he could offer—it was more like leering, as Brienne put it—and showering her with such a surfeit of courtesies that even a queen would blush.

For that was whom he meant to woo: the Queen in the North, they all called her, no matter what she said or did to dissuade them in favor of Stannis.

Sansa knew that if she were to wed Cregan, not only would be become lord of Winterfell by right of marriage, he would also wish to claim the title of King in the North. It was exactly as likely to happen as Stannis giving up the North, content with just six kingdoms, but still the possibility was more than Sansa could bear. Robb had been so young when he was crowned, but even as a boy he had been worth ten times more than such an arrogant, foolish man as Cregan Karstark, who, for all his claims of being a great fighter, remained whole and unblemished while the best of his kinsmen had gone south to fight and die beside Robb. The Starks and Karstarks might trace their ancestry back to the same root, but Sansa could barely believe that Cregan and men like her father and Robb came from the same stock.

She supposed that with so much to gain, it shouldn’t have been a surprise to her that the Karstarks had hastened to Winterfell—arriving earliest only after the nearby Tallharts of Torrhen’s Square—while Wyman Manderly took his time coming up the White Knife. Lord Wyman ruled over a powerful port and always had men, ships, and harvest stores aplenty. He might be their vassal, but it was Sansa and the king who needed to seek favor with the Lord of White Harbor more than he with them. With his lateness, perhaps he knew it.

“Well, now that they’re all here,” Brienne was saying, “let’s hope they can finally start doing something. Having all these idle men around the castle has made me wary. Especially the Karstarks.”

“I don’t think you’ll ever be at ease with our friends from Karhold,” Sansa said. _And neither will I_ , she added to herself. “But I know what you mean. I’m tired of waiting. Stannis is definitely tired of waiting. I’m not sure he even bothered to meet with the Umbers when they arrived yesterday.”

“Oh, he did,” Brienne told her, smirking slightly as she tapped an egg against the table and began to peel it. “It was the same as ever. They refused to swear to anything on their own, he fumed at them for a while, and then they left to go get drunk in the great hall with the others. But at least this time he didn’t come protesting to you about it.”

Sansa nodded, her face falling somewhat in chagrin. “I expect he’s finally realized that I’m not much use at this. I wish I _could_ make them kneel to him, but they’re all still completely loyal to Robb. I’m his heir and they call me their queen, but they’ll still follow Robb before they ever listen to me, a living woman.”

“I wouldn’t say that’s true of them all, my lady. Many of the northern rulers are women now: Karstark, Mormont, Tallhart, Dustin... I think it’s more than understandable that they would rather remain staunch for a Stark queen than bow to a Baratheon king.” Brienne paused, frowning darkly. “ _This_ Baratheon, at least.”

“Stannis is your king as much as he is mine,” Sansa protested. “You’ve been in his service for weeks. I know you were devoted to Lord Renly, but I’d hoped that in time you would stop speaking so... freely about Stannis. I don’t want to see you punished.”

Brienne stopped chewing for a moment and, dropping her shoulders, smoothed over her expression. “Yes, of course, my lady. I forgot myself.” She fixed her luminous blue eyes on Sansa and added, “On my honor I assure you that Stannis has my obedience, but I am still _your_ sworn shield. I answer to you before all others, and I just hope he knows that.”

“I’m sure he does. I am grateful, Lady Brienne.”

They finished eating in peaceable silence. Sansa’s thoughts now resembled a whirlpool, however, as she began wondering for the thousandth time how she could possibly get the northerners under her thumb. They all took fierce pride in their independence, but she knew that when it came to outsiders the very opposite happened: they would join together like wolves in a pack to treat with Stannis, and act only as one. Once resolved, even the Karstarks (and anyone else who might have plans of their own) wouldn’t risk striking out on their own unless they were sure, or just stupid. Stannis still had the minor houses and clans he’d won after defeating the Boltons, but Sansa could not see them keeping faith with him when their fellows were all opposed.

The task facing her was thus especially precarious, for its outcome could only swing one of two ways: complete success or utter failure. She _had_ to convince the rest of the North to rejoin the Seven Kingdoms under Stannis’s banner, or else they would bull forward with this idea of an independent kingdom—with or without her—and try to force Stannis out.

And what would the king do? He would never budge until he got what he came for, an army for this war he meant to wage on the Others. Had he even shown Jon’s letter to any of them yet, or spoken of what it contained?

Sansa’s heart thudded in renewed anxiety thinking of that letter, of Jon and her brothers. What if the northerners didn’t believe Jon’s reports, refused Stannis and raised their troops to drive him out? What if... What if the fighting went on and on until the White Walkers attacked again, this time at the Wall? Jon would die without any aid, and the dead would rush south to make ruins of them all while they were still warring over mere chaff, and Sansa would never see any of her family again, Bran or Rickon or Arya or Jon, and...

“Lady Sansa?”

She looked up.

“Are you all right?” Brienne was staring at her, brow wrinkled in concern. Sansa realized that she had tightened her grip on her cup, that she was struggling to breathe in perfectly good air. She tried to rein herself in.

“Yes. I am, of course. I’m only... There’s so much at stake, and I’m so worried thinking about it all.”

“If I can be of help in any way,” said Brienne, “I hope you’ll say so. I pledged you my sword, but my oaths go beyond mere protection. Even if it’s only easing your mind, I’d be glad to do it. I’m a great worrier myself, my father always said, and I know the toll it can take.”

Sansa cracked a small smile, which widened when she reflected that, to less attentive ears, Brienne might well have called herself a “great warrior.” She had the sudden thought that if Theon were here he’d make a joke of it. She wasn’t thinking of the Theon she had hesitantly spoken to yesterday, the Theon whose voice still shook and who had only just stopped sleeping on the floor of his bedchamber. Rather, it was the old Theon from her memory: the one who was always smiling at his own cleverness and laughing with Robb and lazily play-fighting with her little brothers and Arya.

“Thank you, Brienne. Just talking to you is enough for now. You don’t have any siblings, do you?” she asked, chasing the distraction.

“None still living. My father had two other daughters and a son, but they died young.”

“Weren’t you lonely?”

“I suppose I was, though I don’t remember being unhappy as a child. I was always quiet. And perhaps I would have been even if I had siblings. I can’t imagine being one of five like you.”

“With Jon and Theon, it felt like there were seven of us sometimes,” Sansa smiled ruefully. “I’m sure I would have traded places with you in a heartbeat if you’d asked me then. Now... I would do anything to have just one of them back.”

“When I set out to find Arya, I will not fail you. I swear on the gods, I shall not return without her.”

“I believe that. If we ever _do_ get some hint of her whereabouts...” Sansa bit her lip. “But I’m afraid I may have lost her. And we can’t really be sure of Rickon, can we? Jon didn’t say how he knew, and it’s _Skagos_...” Sansa knew what people said about the mysterious isle in the Bay of Seals. Everyone in the North knew.

Sympathy shone from Brienne’s eyes, but she had no answers. “They will come home to you one day, Lady Sansa. Elsewise the gods are not just. But for now... I always think it’s best to deal with one thing at a time, one day at a time.” She pushed her plate away and got up from the table. “Today, the northerners. Will you address them when they’re all gathered in the hall?”

“At the very least I’ll welcome them to Winterfell and thank them again for their provisions. But I expect Stannis will do most of the talking—I’m only the Lady of Winterfell, no matter what they call me.”

Brienne finished doing up her swordbelt and hesitated.

“I’m just curious, my lady, but don’t you _want_ to be the queen?”

Sansa looked down at her hands folded in her lap. She swallowed. “I did want it, once. When I was young and stupid.”

_It’s the only thing I ever wanted._ How Mother had sighed when she’d said so. How young, how stupid...

“Now I only want my family. Back home with me, all of us safe. The same things my lady mother always wanted.”

“I admired Lady Catelyn for that,” said Brienne solemnly. “She thought of nothing but you and your siblings. She loved you all fiercely.”

The lump that stuck in Sansa’s throat was familiar to her now. “I know. Now I know how she felt. Being queen is nothing to having your loved ones close. And Queen in the North...” She shook her head. “It’s ridiculous. We shouldn’t be divided in a time like this. We need to join together, fight together. King Stannis is right, there is only one enemy. And he’s the only person, king or queen, who’s actually doing anything about it. It’s _him_ we need to rally behind, not me.”

“For your sake, then, I pray the northerners will see that too.”

A horn blew from somewhere upon the castle walls. The Manderlys approached.

Sansa got to her feet.

“Not just for me,” she said, reaching for her cloak. “For everyone.”

Brienne went ahead to don her armor for the day, and Sansa waited for her quietly by the inner-facing window in her room, pulling on gloves as she tried to peer out through the frosted panes. She could just make out a growing crowd in the courtyard, smallfolk and early-rising nobles alike curiously gathering to witness the last arrival.

In less than an hour they would all be sitting in the great hall, and at last, the real task would begin. Sansa had been taught how to speak well, but only as a lady, armed with softness, flattery, and subtlety. Addressing lords and ladies head-on, forcibly shifting their thoughts and judgments, was something she was not at all sure she knew how to do. But there was no time to learn—either she was ready or she wasn’t, and she was about to find out.

She took in a great breath. Jon had told Stannis in his letter that she would be brave, that it was in her blood.

_I am a Stark, yes, I can be brave._

-

A smooth path was worn into the flagstones by centuries of use, but Stannis would have believed the impression in the floor was entirely his doing, for all the pacing he had done there just that morning.

“It’s been well over an hour.” His voice and face alike were even darker than usual as he traced his path around the carved desk that Eddard Stark had used for years as lord of Winterfell. “What is there to consider? I explained the circumstances clearly enough, did I not? As if to a child. They have only two choices, join with me or don’t. It is easy. It _should_ be easy.”

Davos’s tone was patient, his hands clasped behind his back. “Better that they take their time to reach the right decision than rush towards the wrong one, Your Grace.”

“I’ll remind you that _time_ is not something we have a great deal of, Davos. To say nothing of patience.”

Davos cocked his head, keeping silent, but Stannis did not miss the look he exchanged with Sansa Stark, nor the short sigh that left the girl’s lips from where she sat in her late father’s chair. Her eyes, however, remained quite fixed on the room’s featureless ceiling when he paused to shoot a glance at her.

He continued pacing. Whether her frustration was with him or the northerners, he didn’t much care—as long as she felt it. He’d asked her to deliver the rest of the North to him. Instead, it was falling uselessly at her feet.

Of course, the true blame lay with the northerners themselves. It was their decision to make, though to Stannis’s mind they hardly had a choice. On one hand, there was near-certain death. On the other, he offered them an alliance which, when joined together with the Night’s Watch and the wildlings, was perhaps the only hope they’d have against a fast-approaching winter the likes of which Westeros had never known. Life or death. The hope of spring or everlasting winter. The true king... or a false one.

At least they had accepted the truth of the Others and Jon Snow’s account of the massacre at Hardhome readily enough. Wisely, Davos had thought to appeal to Alysane Mormont for the sake of her uncle, the Old Bear. At the cost of his life, Davos told her in the great hall that morning, Lord Mormont had commanded the ranging that led the Night’s Watch straight into the Walkers and the army of the dead. The Young She-Bear (did they _all_ have such names up here?) had nodded, as if she could have remembered her veteran uncle well enough to expect nothing less of him, and then—only then—did silence begin to fill the room. A listening silence. No longer was it just some southern king come to tell them all to kneel and fight his enemies for him. _One of their own_ had been touched by this mysterious foe, and that made it real. The northerners seemed not to demur when confronted with tales that suddenly crystallized into truth, trading fiction for fact as one might exchange soiled clothes for fresh garments.

Then again, the North was a land of tree gods and direwolves, of howling winters that beckoned every living thing into untimely death and men who were said to feast on the flesh of other men. Its people knew little of pleasure and much of hardship, and Stannis supposed that those who rarely paid heed to caution here (whether out of doubt or sloth) were just as rarely rewarded with long lives. Tales and omens formed a natural part of such caution; while others in the realm might scoff at their foolishness, the people of the North were too busy surviving to care.

If _they_ had not believed in the Others, perhaps Stannis might not have found anyone who believed at all. But they did, and he’d thought that at last, he must surely have them now.

That flicker of hope sputtered out, along with all common sense, as soon as he put his plan to them.

“I’d rather the Others take me than fight beside wildlings. Worse than ironborn, them. Savages!”

“Might as well bring down the Wall and let the wildlings live among us!”

“You mean for us to leave King Robb unavenged? His lady mother and the Ned? That’s this girl’s family—our _queen’s_ family. The Lannisters must pay!”

“They slaughtered my sister at the Red Wedding. The old ways say blood for blood.”

“My brothers died at Lannister hands—”

“They have my lord nephew hostage—”

“Wylis is my last son and heir. I cannot leave him to the lions.”

When the uproar finally died down, Stannis had forced his words through clenched teeth.

“It’s clear you are all of one mind when it comes to vengeance. But if that’s so, I wonder why you didn’t join forces earlier to march south for Lannister blood.” He measured out a pause. “Perhaps you realized Roose Bolton was a dangerous man, and you were wary of crossing him. Well, I crossed him, and I finished him. But suppose someone else had done you this service before me, and you were free to make your move. What would you have done? What is it you’ll do now? You know the Lannisters are ready to execute their prisoners if threatened. You have no hostages of your own to make a trade, and little hope of capturing one. Meanwhile, we are running out of time. Let your sons and nephews wait, and vengeance too; there is only one war to fight—”

“We’ve done our waiting!” interrupted Mors Umber, the one they called Crowfood, setting off a roar of approval and another round of what seemed to pass for reasoned discussion amongst the northerners.

“Aye, we’ll be quick about the deed, too. The Lannisters won’t know what’s struck them until our swords are buried in their throats.”

“We take your claims seriously, Lord Stannis,” Alysane Mormont put in bluntly, “but I won’t let my sister’s bones turn to dust before I avenge her.”

Stannis was not insensible to the powerful feelings that vengeance could produce in men and women. It was a worthy cause, born of duty and carried through by strength of will, a way to right wrongs on behalf of those who no longer could. Yet lately, it had been his greatest nuisance, worse than a sore tooth. First the wildlings, cursing and spitting on the frozen ground whenever they caught sight of him after he’d had Mance Rayder executed a traitor; then Brienne of Tarth, to remind him of his brother’s ghost—as if so many of his dreams were not awash in Renly’s blood already. With these northerners, at least Stannis had had no hand in the fate of their kinsmen, but the task of overcoming their vengeful passions was plainly not made any less difficult for it.

Brienne had been swayed from what she considered her duty to Renly by the call to protect the still-living Stark daughters: in other words, a higher purpose. Stannis had thought to take a similar approach with the northmen, but even fighting back the Others, this most crucial of purposes, lost much of its persuasive power when the enemy was obscured behind centuries of ancient legend and a wall of ice that spanned from one coast to the other.

There was, as well, a more immediate cause to his troubles with the northerners. Sansa Stark had bestirred herself then to remind them of it.

“Lady Alysane,” her voice suddenly rang out. “You meant to call him King Stannis, I’m sure. You know that I’ve bent the knee to His Grace on behalf of my house, and I expected my lords and ladies to follow suit. All of you. Are you not sworn bannermen of House Stark?”

Mormont had frowned as low mutters erupted around the hall, but Sansa did not falter, though Stannis had noticed that her folded hands were almost imperceptibly atremble.

“I also expected you to realize, as I have, that although we must meet the Lannisters and Freys with justice, nothing is more important than keeping those loved ones who remain safe. And nothing is a greater threat to that safety than what His Grace has spoken of today; not the Freys, not the Lannisters, not even wildlings. We should obey our king in this... and in all things.”

Stannis’s head ached with a dull throb, recalling how the northerners had burst into protest yet again at this last remark. _The only king I know is King Robb of House Stark!_ many of them had said. _What do we need a southern king for, to fight these frozen demons?_ said others.

It was a question he had privately raised to himself, to be sure. If the red woman were beside him still, she would tell him again that he was R’hllor’s champion, and that was all the reason there was. In reality, she had abandoned him like a newborn pup on Winterfell’s doorstep, and the longer Stannis stayed in the North, the more he apprehended how he was almost a foreigner in this place. There was little Andal and Rhoynar influence here even centuries after the invasion—instead, the First Men lived on in their northern descendants, keeping their old gods and their old ways. This left little room for the Seven, or for septas and septons and knights; chivalry was a lesser ideal, for what use was any of it except honor?

But then, if he did not believe in the Seven, or the old gods or the red, what else could Stannis say he believed in besides duty and honor? In this, he and the northerners had common ground. He may have been born south of the Neck, but south of the Neck had never made a place for him, denying him Storm’s End and casting him out like so much night soil to Dragonstone when he was not occupied with running Robert’s kingdom for him. Meanwhile, he had already proven his strength here in the North; he deserved as much respect for that as any full-blooded northman. And as far as blood was concerned, he too could boast ancestry from the First Men if pressed: his line stretched back to the storm kings of old, with no less than Durran Godsgrief at its root.

He might have said all of this, too, if Wyman Manderly—a big man with a big voice to match—had not chosen that moment to call for the makeshift council that Stannis was currently waiting on to conclude. Sansa Stark had pointedly not been invited to this meeting, to her marked surprise, but Manderly had insisted with all courtesy. Stannis misliked this; it meant that he lacked an advocate in the midst of whatever they were discussing.

The Lady of Winterfell now stood at one of the windows looking out over the castle. Her gaze seemed fixed on a particular point below, and after Stannis had completed two more circuits of the solar she abruptly turned around, gathering her skirts.

“Your Grace, I can’t bear to be unoccupied for a moment longer,” she said to him. “I’d like to go down to the gatehouse and oversee the stonemasons, with your leave.”

“If the council finishes before you return, someone else will have to go search for you,” said Stannis sourly. “No.”

“I’m hardly disappearing into the crypts,” Sansa insisted. She directed an appealing look at Davos. “The gatehouse is well visible from many parts of the castle. And I’m no longer a child, to be struck by the urge to play peek-and-sneak.”

Davos seemed amused as he looked up over the book he was practicing on. “I really cannot see any harm in it, Your Grace.”

“Fine, then.” Stannis did not know how a smile could be _loud_ , but the one Lady Sansa bestowed upon Davos somehow filled the room. “As it seems I have nothing better to do, I shall go with you.”

“Your Grace is, of course, welcome.”

He had already pulled on his gloves. “Davos, you will join me when they’re ready for us.”

Once they were outside, flanked by a silent Brienne of Tarth, Stannis and Sansa watched as a pair of stonemasons worked to saw out a block of granite above the gatehouse. It contained a carving of the Stark direwolf, but the head of the wolf had been crudely chipped away, defaced by the Boltons during their occupancy at Winterfell. It was the same for almost every other appearance of Stark heraldry throughout the castle. Even the high seat of the Lord of Winterfell, with its snarling twin direwolves that doubled as arms, had been removed from its usual place in the great hall so that it could be repaired. This suited Stannis very well; it was practically a throne, and to have Sansa Stark sitting in it while he sat in some lesser chair would have only heightened his difficulties with the northerners.

“The maester’s turret is still ruins,” he observed, squinting up at the tower behind them. “I would have thought you’d attend to that first. Or the stables—it looks like a strong wind could knock them over. This,” he gestured back to the gatehouse, “is mere decoration.”

Sansa turned to look at him. “I disagree, Your Grace. What you see as mere decoration is, in the North, a powerful symbol. My lord father always said so. This is as important as anything else, and I won’t spare any expense restoring it.”

“Must your new maester wait until the stone direwolves in the most obscure corner of the outer bailey are restored before he is to have a place to work? Are armies to starve while Winterfell’s glass gardens remain bare and open to the elements, deemed less important than a symbol?”

“I’ve already commissioned new panes of glass and asked the steward to find someone to tend the gardens. The stonemasons will reconstruct the maester’s turret when enough building material is had and the most important of these carvings are replaced, _and_ it will all be in time for the new maester’s arrival.” Sansa lifted her brow archly at him. “I can assure Your Grace that unlike some, I have not been idle during these long weeks of waiting.”

The king drew himself up angrily at the mockery he heard in these words. “Tread carefully, my lady. Your insolence comes as a surprise, but not even your birth and sex will protect you from my wrath should you mock me again.”

Lady Sansa blinked, eyebrows falling unhappily, and lowered her head. “If I have offended, I apologize. I thought...” She paused for a long moment. “I see I was too familiar with you.”

“I’m not here seeking friendship from you northerners,” he said shortly. _No, that would have been Robert._ “It’s your allegiance I need.”

“You have it from me, Your Grace.”

He acknowledged this with a nod, ignoring the agitated creaking of Brienne’s armor.

“I pray you don’t forget I am your only sure ally at present,” Sansa added in a cautious tone. “Well, aside from the Karstarks, perhaps... should you wed Lady Alys.”

One of the stoneworkers gave a warning shout as she spoke, then dropped the sawed-out block of stone to the ground below. Stannis laughed without humor. “You’ve been paying attention,” he said, watching as an apprentice carefully began to climb the ladder. The boy wore a sling around his body holding the replacement piece, already cut roughly to size.

“I think they’ve made it difficult to miss. I am surprised Lord Arnolf hasn’t come forward with it yet.”

“Yes,” was all Stannis chose to say. He thought the whole idea contemptible, not worthy of further talk or even the effort of thinking about. He was not so desperate as that.

The stonemasons were at work vigorously stirring a pail of mortar paste when, at last, he heard Davos hailing him from behind. It was a moment before he noticed Theon Greyjoy trailing after him, looking smaller than someone of his birth and position ought.

“Your Grace,” said Greyjoy in his hoarse voice. “The northerners have finished their council and wish for you to rejoin them.”

“Took them long enough.” The king looked to Lady Sansa, who was picking up her skirts to step forward, but Greyjoy spoke again.

“Sorry, but not you, my lady. That is—” he stammered, “Your Gr—I mean, my lady. They wish... King Stannis only.”

“Theon, what are you talking about?” said Sansa, before Stannis could say the same. “Do you mean they have something to say to King Stannis but not me?”

“Yes.”

“But... why?”

“I don’t know.”

Stannis was as perplexed as any of them as to what this might portend, but it made him all the more keen to find out what the council had decided. “I will share with you what I can afterwards, my lady,” he said briskly. “Until then, it seems you’re free to look after these precious carvings of yours.”

He turned his back on her and Lady Brienne and began walking toward the keep. Davos soon fell into step beside him, with Greyjoy not far behind.

“I don’t like this, Your Grace,” muttered Davos. “First they bar her from their council, now this. What could they have to say that they can’t say to the both of you? She’s your ally, that’s a fact, and right now we couldn’t ask for a better one. They may well be trying to drive a wedge between the two of you.”

“If I could win the North at the expense of Sansa Stark, why would I refuse? She is loyal and able, but... numbers win wars, Davos. She is one woman, head of a house that’s been all but decimated. I think I could bear that loss.”

“I might remind Your Grace that when Roose Bolton tried to take charge of the North without the Starks, he failed. The loyalty these people have to Winterfell is not to be underestimated. Whatever they have in store, it’s more likely to be to Lady Sansa’s advantage than yours in the end.”

“Then we’ll unearth some other Stark,” said Stannis impatiently, “and install him in Winterfell. Jon Snow remains, and if his word is to be trusted, so does Rickon Stark. There is even the sister, possibly.”

“Begging your pardon, but I’ve never known you to ignore rights of inheritance. Lady Sansa has Winterfell. She has gone through enough to deserve it, too.”

Stannis pursed his lips, falling silent. It was true, he would be no better than Robert, to give Winterfell to a younger sibling. And no, he did not want to break ties with Sansa Stark, either. But if forced to choose, he would not spare the gentle feelings of a lady at the expense of winning a war they could not afford to lose.

Davos turned to Greyjoy. “Do you happen to know anything of the northerners’ plans?”

The wretch somehow always looked guilty. “I don’t know anything,” he hastened to say. “Truthfully, I was avoiding them. I know how little they trust me, even with Your Grace clearing my name. I only happened upon Arnolf Karstark, who bid me summon you.”

“Arnolf Karstark?” the king wondered aloud.

“At your service, Your Grace,” came a thin voice. Rounding the corner was Karstark himself, as ancient and gnarled as an oak tree. He bowed, somehow. “I volunteered to bring you back, only to find that my old bones were not quite up to the task. Young Greyjoy here has my thanks.”

“Why leave the room at all? You could have just as well sent one of your men.” Stannis glanced at Greyjoy. “You may go.”

“As I say, Your Grace,” said Karstark as Theon shuffled off, “my bones are so old, and I feel it does me good to take them out for a walk every now and then. If the walk is not too long, you see.” He grinned, revealing a number of crooked, yellow teeth. They continued on their way to the great hall, but now the old man was slowing them down considerably despite the cane he leaned on. “And if I may, I wished to broach a private matter with Your Grace before... while I have the chance.”

Stannis could scarcely endure their glacial pace, but he supposed that any northman who knew him for the king deserved, at the moment, to be heard. “Speak.”

“I will say that House Karstark bled as much as any in the war. As Your Grace already knows, my nephew Lord Rickard and his sons lost their lives at the end of one sword or another. Make no mistake, I, too, thirst for Lannister blood. But although I am an aged man, your words haven’t fallen on deaf ears. Sometimes there is a greater battle to fight, even though we may not see it yet. I’m old enough to know that is often the case.” He let out a wheezy chuckle, but it was weak and quickly stifled. “If you agreed to what I propose, House Karstark would be glad to pledge itself fully to you and your cause. I am proud to say that we field a greater force than any other northern house now.”

“As I understand it, my lord,” Davos cut in, sounding so mistrustful that Stannis forgave his impertinence in speaking first, “it’s due to House Karstark’s abandonment of Robb Stark halfway through the war that your numbers remain so enviable. How can we be sure you won’t turn your backs on King Stannis, either?”

“The boy was young, inexperienced. We joined up to go kill Lannisters, but my beloved lord nephew ended up losing his head for killing Lannisters.” Arnolf shook his head mournfully. “I ask you, where is the justice in that?”

“Were they not Lannister _boys_? Innocents?” Davos pressed.

“I do not think there are innocents in war, my lord, only—”

Stannis held up a hand for silence. “Just tell me what you propose, Karstark.”

“Simply a bond of marriage, Your Grace. Wed our sweet Alys and our houses will forge an unshakable alliance.”

It was a moment before the sound of the king’s laughter emerged, slow and sardonic.

“Ah, this is no jape, Your Grace,” said Karstark, shifting uncomfortably on his cane.

“If only it were.” Stannis was shaking his head, still tasting the irony of having acknowledged this very prospect with Sansa Stark moments ago. “And now I wonder more powerfully than ever what you northerners have decided, for you to come to me with this now—underhandedly, no less.”

“Underhanded, Your Grace? I offer you my great-niece with pride and make no secret of it. Who the king marries is a matter of interest to all, don’t you agree?”

“And who the Lady of Karhold marries is a matter of interest chiefly to herself. Somehow I get the feeling she has no notion of how much _pride_ her beloved uncle takes in her, to offer her to the king.” He paused to sneer at Karstark from head to toe, disliking every inch of him. “I address you as a lord out of courtesy, Arnolf, but I’ve not forgotten you’re only a castellan. You do not speak for House Karstark yet, and you shall certainly not earn that right by marrying Lady Alys off to me.”

His patience gone at last, Stannis lengthened his stride and made for the doors of the great hall which were finally in sight.

“I assure Your Grace that my offer is to our mutual advantage,” called Arnolf, still limping behind. “I think you will find yourself reconsidering it sooner or later.”

Crossing the threshold into the dim, smoky hall where the northerners awaited, Stannis soon dismissed this last remark from his mind.

-

Davos kept an uneasy eye on Arnolf Karstark while the northerners sat amongst themselves spitting sourleaf and snorting like horses. The old man had hobbled in not long after Stannis and himself and gone straight to exchange quiet words with his son Cregan, who occupied a corner slightly apart from Lady Alys.

Davos was not an overly suspicious man by his own reckoning—only cautious—but it was difficult to take even the sun for how it appeared this day. The way every northerner had turned to watch Stannis enter the hall again, assessing him like merchants in port; the way Cregan Karstark’s gaze traveled the room now, the arrogance behind it barely hidden; Arnolf’s last words; and Sansa Stark, shut out of her own hall... He hardly knew where to begin. But he could not shake the feeling that however brazen a move Karstark had just made, it was only the harbinger of something bolder, something even more likely to displease the king.

Stannis had meant it when he refused Karstark’s offer, Davos knew. His king had no intention of being wed again, not after his tepid partnership with Queen Selyse and not after establishing Shireen as his heir beyond a doubt. So it was not a question of what would come of the offer; the question was what it _meant_.

If, gods forbid it, the North had decided _not_ to accept Stannis as king, then how did it serve Arnolf Karstark to go against his own? Even if his scheme prevailed and Karhold became his, the king was sure to straightaway call upon all of Arnolf’s resources for whatever inevitable clash there would be against a North that did not want Stannis Baratheon and his army any longer. The elder Karstark had far more to lose in such a splintered struggle than he had to gain. He did not appear to be an especially daring man, after all, his ripe old age no doubt the fruit of his wiles rather than his strength. Indeed, he was the sort of man who stood behind castle walls, unneeded, while far-off armies took to battle. But if the northerners _had_ in fact agreed to bend the knee to Stannis, then another great army would soon be raised to meet the dead beyond the Wall, and Arnolf Karstark would again remain hunched behind his curtains of stone and mortar. Only this time, he meant to be called a lord while doing so.

On this reasoning alone, it seemed the likelier outcome that the North had swayed in Stannis’s favor. And yet Davos knew it could not be so simple. He knew what Karstark wanted, but what did the other northerners want? They wanted vengeance, they wanted their families, they wanted their kingdom. Davos could not see how they expected to be given even one of these things.

_I should have been born cleverer_ , he thought as Lord Manderly reappeared, again the last to arrive. _Or at least less common than dirt. Then I might better understand the minds of these highborn lords and ladies_.

“I am sorry to have kept you waiting,” the Lord of White Harbor called out, settling heavily into his seat. “Travel, like much else, tends to unsettle my stomach. I think you must be rather impatient to hear what we’ve discussed.”

“I think that would be putting it lightly,” Stannis responded.

“Well, know this. Not everyone in this room agreed with what we’re about to put to you, but you’ll have no luck trying to divide us now, should you mislike it. You are in the North, my lord—we wolves know better than to stray from the pack. Here, the lone wolf does not last long.”

Glancing at the Karstarks, Davos saw father and son exchange a brief but distinct look.

The king, meanwhile, had begun to grind his teeth; with such a preface, how could he expect to like it? “I’m ready to hear it, then.”

“You call yourself king and ask us for a loyalty we have already sworn to another. Sansa Stark _is_ our queen, heir to Robb Stark’s crown. But if we must join together as you say, then there is no simpler way. You are both unwed now, for better or worse. Take Sansa Stark for your queen, and we will take you for our king.”

Stannis was still for a long, stunned moment. Davos did not dare to breathe.

Then, with staggering calm, the king spoke.

“An absurd suggestion, and I’ve heard several today. Do you mock me, my lords?”

“No,” said Lord Wyman. “This is no farce or jape, although I have brought a fine fool with me. With all respect, we are sorry for the loss of your wife, the Lady Selyse, but surely you realize that without a means to produce heirs beyond Lady Shireen, your claim stands on uneven ground. You’re at war, and the child, forgive me, has seen illness before. Your line may be extinguished in a moment.”

Stannis’s eyes narrowed at once. “Is that a threat?”

“See reason, Lord Stannis,” said Alysane Mormont, gruff and unfazed by the king’s anger. “There are a good many of us who want to stand with you for what you’ve done and what you promise. We don’t doubt your word nor your honor. But what about our word? Our honor? We laid our swords before Robb Stark’s feet, and by rights, Sansa Stark is now the Queen in the North. If you’d deny her that title, then we’ll take nothing less than seeing her named Queen of the Seven Kingdoms.”

“It is ill done to speak of this when the smoke has barely cleared over the pyre of my late wife,” Stannis warned. “I have no need of another. Shireen recovered fully from her sickness as a babe and has been as hale as any girl ever since. She is protected by my finest men. She will follow me.”

“We’re quite determined in this, my lord. We serve a crowned Stark, or we serve no one.”

Amid murmurs of agreement, Stannis turned slightly in his chair to throw an incredulous look at Davos, who remained impassive.

“And what if I were to marry your queen off to one of you unwed beggar lords instead?” Stannis said, returning to the northerners. “To Cerwyn, say, or Karstark? Would you all follow him, then? Would he be your king?”

“T’would be an ambitious and foolish lord who chooses that,” growled Mors Umber. “We’d be quick to remind him of his duty.”

Another voice added, “The alliance between the North and the throne must be forged anew.”

“Is it not enough that I’ve liberated Winterfell?” the king snapped. “Or that I arrived in aid of the Night’s Watch when no one else heeded their pleas? The North should be mine. Robb Stark had no right to declare himself king. It is all one realm.”

“In wedding Sansa Stark, you would make it so.”

“ _I will not!_ ” Stannis spat between clenched teeth, the veins in his temple bulging dangerously. He collected himself after several harsh moments, continuing tightly as before. “She is too young. I need not tell you she has suffered.”

“As husbands and fathers ourselves, our hearts are full of sorrow for our lady,” said Lord Manderly. “But she is a Stark. She understands her duty. And I’m sure you realize she’s a maiden no longer. No—a woman grown, and not unpleasant to look upon.”

Robett Glover—a humble man at odds with the mailed fist of his house embroidered on his breast—agreed. “She is the light of the North. Lovelier than even her lady mother, may the gods give her peace.”

A chorus of ayes echoed round the room, and Stannis stared on, looking less astonished and more weary by the second. But if Davos knew his king, he was far from convinced, and far from giving in.

“Lady Sansa was wed to Bolton’s beast of a son nearly two months ago and forced to share his bed almost every night. Yet the maesters—and the evidence of my eyes—assure me that in all that time, no child took root in her belly. Do you mean to tell me that whilst she was kept locked up in her own room, Lady Sansa somehow smuggled in enough moon tea to last her the course of that marriage? Because I must tell you it sounds as if the lady is barren.”

(In hindsight it had been exceedingly shrewd, Davos thought, for the northerners to insist on seeing the indelicate Stannis and poor Sansa Stark separately.)

Mors Umber stood up. “We don’t presume to tell you that at all, my lord. You see, I’ve had the pleasure of, ah, _knowing_ a serving-woman here who, with her own eyes, saw the rise and fall of Roose Bolton as Warden of the North.” Crowfood’s eyes were merry. “She told me many sweet things, but sweetest of all was this secret: Ramsay Snow had a lover. It was the kennelmaster’s daughter, if I remember right, and they went on for years—but he never got a bastard on her. Would such a wretch of a girl have been so careful, or had it within her means to take moon tea the whole time?”

He paused grandly, surveying the corroborating nods and mutters of his peers. “I think not, my lords. The fault lies with the bastard’s seed. Aye, as corrupt as his blood!”

The muttering spiked into shouts of agreement, and the nods into fists banging on the tables. The king endured the tumult in cold silence, and at length it drained away.

“This is folly,” he said, his jaw straining. “Suppose I were to take Sansa Stark as my queen. _Stark_ is her name. Her place is in the North—so it has ever been for those of her House. Rickard Stark, Brandon, Lady Lyanna... Lord Eddard should have heeded the lessons from his family history and never left this castle to take up the badge of the Hand. If I should prevail at the end of all things and live to see the dawn with Lady Sansa for my wife, she would join me in King’s Landing. And who rules Winterfell then, with her sister and brothers lost? You lords would squabble like hens amongst yourselves for the right, leaving me to choose from _your_ undeserving ranks. No. Lady Sansa is by far preferable to any of you. Her name notwithstanding, she’s already proved herself more sensible, leal, and graceful than the best of you.”

“Don’t forget beautiful, my lord!” crowed Mors Umber. “Altogether fine qualities for any man’s wife, to say nothing of a king who’ll be wanting heirs!”

Wyman Manderly rose laboriously to his feet as the remark earned appreciative chuckles. Stannis focused his attention on the Lord of White Harbor, the better to ignore Umber’s coarseness. “Lord Manderly,” he said unhappily. “Do you nominate yourself for lordship of Winterfell already?”

“I am content with White Harbor, my lord, which has afforded me and mine with many comforts,” said the big man. “And comfort besides, as lord of a vital port city, I’ve been privy to a great deal of valuable information from far and wide. I will tell you now one such example, and I beg your indulgence, for you’ll want to hear this.

“Half a year ago, a wayward young lad came into the custody of my harbormaster, a lad by the name of Wex. An Iron Islander, very far from home. The boy is mute, and for months we couldn’t make sense of his purpose.

“But I’m nothing if not a patient man, and at length we learned a good many things from him, much of which you already know. You see, my lord, Wex was Theon Greyjoy’s squire at the time of Winterfell’s capture. He told us, as you did, that the Boltons burned this castle, and that in truth, Greyjoy did not kill Bran and Rickon Stark.”

“Aye, ‘twas a pair of miller’s boys, he says,” muttered a scowling northerner. “As innocent as our princes.”

Stannis waved an impatient hand at Manderly, urging him to continue.

“Our lad Wex found Prince Bran and Rickon’s trail after the Boltons sacked Winterfell and began following them. The brothers parted ways during the journey, and Wex tracked Rickon, his wildling guardian, and the direwolf all the way to the sea, at which point he could follow no further.”

The room was silent now, and Wyman Manderly’s eyes were gleaming.

“But the boy says there’s no doubt. Rickon Stark lives, and has found refuge on an isle in the frozen North. Skagos is where we will find our Lord of Winterfell.”

Stannis absorbed the news without a change in expression, ignoring the unusual hush that had fallen over the room. And after a moment, he spoke, his voice flat and tired.

“Yes, Skagos. I’ve had word from Jon Snow that he believes his half-brother to be at this place, though his evidence isn’t so certain as yours. I’m told it’s a dangerous land. A frozen isle inhabited by unruly warlords, little different from wildlings, who seem to think themselves exempt from the laws of men—even from tax. You think a boy, a pampered little lordling of Winterfell, would have any sway in such a place? That he lives still?”

“The direwolf is a powerful symbol of the north,” said Lord Manderly. “If the wolf remains beside Rickon Stark, then he’s protected by more than just the beast’s fangs.”

“That could be. So an heir to Winterfell might be found.” Stannis was tapping his fingers on the table, a staccato without rhythm. “It changes nothing of my views on taking Sansa Stark to wife. The answer, I tire of telling you, is no. I would have her remain in her position unchanged. She’ll take a lord consort of her own choosing, or speak with me on the matter for the most appropriate match. Or she may choose to wait until a Stark heir is recovered, in which case it falls to her brother to make such decisions when the time is right.”

“Then our fealty remains with House Stark alone. We’ll put in a prayer for your good fortune before the old gods, but we won’t answer to you, Lord Stannis. Only our queen.”

Stannis made a harsh noise of displeasure deep in his throat, which was followed by the sound of his teeth grinding anew. He laid his hands flat on the table, preparing to rise.

“I assume Lady Sansa has no notion of this folly yet?”

“No, not as yet. We seek an audience with the queen later this afternoon.”

“There’s no need. She’ll reject your offer as firmly as I have. You’d be better served applying your scheming minds to other matters, my lords. Namely, how to marshal your resources to support me in the wars to come. We’ll meet again on the morrow, and I expect better.”


End file.
